


As Red As Love

by dollylux



Series: As Red As Love [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Aka How It Should Be, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Punk, Anal Sex, Bathroom Sex, Bucky Barnes Has PTSD, Cheating, Clubbing, College Student Wanda, Depression, Everyone Is Gay, Exhibitionism, F/F, Homophobic Language, Infidelity, Mildly Dubious Consent, Or At Least Bisexual, Past Child Abuse, Punk Natasha, Strap-Ons, Tour Bus, Touring, Twinspeak, Witch Wanda, binding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-14
Updated: 2015-10-21
Packaged: 2018-04-20 19:21:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 59,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4799336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dollylux/pseuds/dollylux
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Natasha's band Pussy Party hires a tour manager for their upcoming tour; Simon "Vision" Williams whose girlfriend/assistant Wanda has caught Natasha's eye.</p>
<p>(Punk AU in which Natasha is a deliciously butch lesbian guitarist with a fear of commitment who falls for someone she can't [shouldn't] have.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. a new poetry

**Author's Note:**

> This universe was built with inspiration from the characters in the MCU as well as their counterparts in the comic books. For instance, Vision is Simon Williams in this story, someone known as Wonder Man in the comics from whom the Vision's mannerisms and memories come. This is purely indulgent and something I have been wanting to write for a year. So here goes nothin'!

“No.”

_ERR-ERR-ERR-ERR-ERR--_

“No, shut up.”

_\--ERR-ERR-ERR-ERR--_

“Nat?” Thor’s voice is surprisingly gentle on the other side of her door. He knocks before he opens it a crack, but Natasha keeps her face buried firmly under the blankets.

“Noo.”

“Babe, your alarm’s been goin’ off for fifteen minutes. At least hit snooze or something.”

She sighs and unearths her arm from the warm haven under the covers and fishes around blindly on the nightstand for her alarm clock. She smacks at the off button until everything is blessedly quiet once more.

“Thank you!” comes Loki’s voice from somewhere in the house. Nat glares where nobody can see it.

“Did he send you in here, Thorbert?”

She can tell by the silence that immediately follows that she’s right.

“He didn’t--”

“You’re so whipped.”

“He’s my brother!” 

Nat uncovers her head to squint blearily across the room at Thor whose hair is pulled back in an adorable man-bun and who is as red as the girl’s mouth Natasha fucked last night. She smirks at him.

“Because that’s relevant.”

“Anyway,” Thor rushes out, his giant arms bulging as he folds them defensively across his bare chest, “I just made some fresh-squeezed orange juice, in case you’re interested.”

“Hm.” Natasha gathers all of her strength and forces herself to sit up, a hand immediately going into the rat’s nest of her hair, not to fix it but to rub at her scalp to try and ease her hangover away.

“And, uh. Loki made some of that ungodly strong coffee you two drink--”

Nat’s head shoots up, eyes suddenly focused.

“Yes.”

Thor smiles at her in what can only be taken as pity.

“I’ll pour you a cup. Get dressed. You work this morning, right?”

She only grunts as a reply before throwing her covers back and climbing out of bed, not bothering to cover her panty-clad ass or tug down her tank top as she shuffles toward her dresser. Everybody in the house has seen more of each other than most people see of their spouses, and everybody that could possibly want to fuck each other has or is currently dating.

Being the only lesbian in a house of gay dudes has its advantages.

“Is that a hickey on your ass?”

Natasha turns to glare at him.

“Don’t you have a brother to kiss good morning?”

Thor disappears then, not bothering to deny it. Natasha, considering that a victory, opens a drawer and starts to pull clothes out.

She comes downstairs in jeans held together by patches and hope and a T.S.O.L. t-shirt that had once belonged to Bucky. She smiles at Clint and Sam who are eating cereal at the table all zombie-like while Loki washes dishes, his headphones on, tiny ass moving to whatever beat is currently destroying his hearing. 

Sam raises his spoon in greeting and Natasha signs _good morning_ to Clint as she gathers the travel mug on the counter, not pausing when Loki leans over to kiss her cheek.

“Have a good day at work, hubs.”

Natasha rolls her eyes and slips into her shitkickers by the door, giving a glance at the insanity of her red mohawk in the mirror above the key rack but not doing a damn thing to fix it. 

It’s gonna get messed up under her helmet anyway.

 

She and Leech open the shop with few words between them, putting money in the drawer and putting CDs and records back from where fuckheads had left them laying around the night before, and Nat lets Leech pick the first album of the morning to play because he looks like he wants to be here even less than she does.

Fifteen minutes later, GG Allin is blaring from the speakers and Basement Rekkids is open for business. Natasha climbs up onto the counter and nurses her coffee while Leech skanks in the reggae section. A guy comes in before her cup’s empty, wearing a baggy Rush shirt and heading straight toward her like he’s on a mission.

“Need help?” She clears her throat, her voice still wrecked from last night. He smirks at her in a way that Natasha assumes is supposed to be flirtatious, leaning on the counter next to where she’s sitting. She glances over at Leech who is still dancing obliviously.

“Hey, doll. You’ve got _Appetite for Destruction_ , right?”

She just stares at him with what Steve calls her Garfield-face: one completely void of any emotion or expression and meant specifically for men.

“...What?”

He scoffs at her, standing up now and pushing a hand into his stringy hair.

“G’n’R? C’mon, honey, you’ve got t--”

“You’re making me have a conversation about Guns’n’Roses before noon on a Tuesday.” It’s not a question, and she still hasn’t given inflection to a single word yet. The guy falters then, like he’s not really sure what to say since she’s not embarrassed. He glances down at her t-shirt and sneers at her, folding his arms over his chest and nodding down at it.

“Well, if you knew anything about the band on your shirt, you’d know that they were fuckin’ _friends_ with G’n’R.”

Natasha smirks at him, setting her coffee down and leaning forward so far that the dude has to take a step back.

“Just because I think _Dance with Me_ was amazing doesn’t mean I condone anybody being friends with Axl Rose or that I liked anything after _Revenge_. And if you’re _such_ a fan, why the fuck don’t you already own that monstrosity?”

The guys eyes widen with fury.

“My ex-girlfriend smashed my copy the night we broke--”

“She did two good things in one night? Smart girl. Hey, Leech?” Natasha cranes her head back to yell over GG. Leech stops mid-move and shuffles over, scratching at his shiny bald head.

“Yeh?”

“This bro here has a question about the morality of buying a Guns’n’Roses album, and he asked specifically for you.” She hops down from the counter and saunters toward the back of the store and the breakroom. She’s totally justified in taking a smoke break and a nap after that bullshit, right?

 

The basement at the house is spacious and soundproof and a gift for Pussy Party from Tony when they got signed with Shield Records last year, a gift that had made Natasha cry for probably the fourth time in her entire life. 

The rest of the band are there when she finally gets home from work, and she can already hear Carol and Darcy arguing as she makes her way down the stairs, her boots clomping and announcing her arrival.

“I just don’t get why we always open with ‘The Dick Strangler,’ C. Your voice fuckin’ _kills_ on ‘Lunatic’. It’s the best way to introduce people to the band. Fantastic first impression and all that.” Darcy looks earnest and serious for once, her mouth lovely and glossy and pulled into a frown as she watches Carol who is sitting on the concrete ground in front of her mic stand, twirling the cords absently between her fingers.

“It also wrecks my voice from the jump, Darce. Then I’m just fucked for the rest of the set.” Carol sighs and leans back against Sif’s drums. They all look up at Natasha when she walks in, and no one smiles or says hello. 

“Nice to see you ladies, too,” Natasha intones as she takes her guitar off the stand and tugs it around her body, looking around for the amp cord. 

“Arguing about the setlist for Friday,” Sif informs her, annoyance threaded through every word. “Again.”

“Look, you guys are lucky I’m even going on this weekend. My throat is killing me. I’ve been sucking on cough drops all day and I can’t stop sneezing--”

“We know, Carol. You’ve been bitching about it since you got here!” Darcy is practically scowling now, and it’s so unlike her that it takes everything in Natasha not to go to her, touch her, try to calm her down. But it’s hard enough being in a band with somebody you used to be in a kind-of relationship with, let alone one that maybe didn’t end on the best note. She glances back at Sif who is staring at her, her mouth pulled into a firm line.

“Hey, wait, let’s just.” Natasha takes a deep breath, trying to calm down and find some patience left after a long day of working retail. “Let’s not even entertain the thought of changing the setlist for Friday. Maybe we can talk about it for our next round of gigs. But it’s too late to go fucking with things now. Alright?”

She looks at the other three, ending on Darcy with raised eyebrows. “Alright?”

Darcy glares at her fiercely, blue eyes practically flickering with anger.

“Alright,” she grits out.

“Alright.” Natasha sighs, plugging her guitar in and digging a pick out of her pocket. “C’mon, let’s at least run through a few songs.”

She starts to strum while everyone just watches her, stubborn and annoyed and not moving to join her. She clears her throat and opens her mouth to sing, her voice husky and rough but it works.

“This little light of miiiine, I’m gonna let it shiiiine.. This little l--”

“Ugh, Nat! Goddamnit.” Carol laughs so hard from her curl on the floor that she starts coughing, and Natasha grins as Darcy picks up in the song where she left off and Sif tries to find a beat with her.

Crisis averted.

 

She drags herself upstairs an hour later, shuffling into the livingroom to find the couches piled with boys: Bucky, Clint, Bruce, Thor, and Tony specifically.

“Lucy, I’m home!” She says over the wrestling match on the TV in her best Ricky Ricardo voice, and she gets a chorus of grunts and words as a reply.

“There’s some Thai take-out on the counter in there, if you’re hungry,” Bruce tells her, not taking his eyes away from the television, and Natasha wants to kick Clint for getting all of them involved in the soap opera drama of the WWE or whatever the fuck.

“Nat, I put in a call to that friend of mine for you. Vision, remember? He’s been off in LA working with record producers or something. He seems really interested in helping you guys out with the tour. I gave him Carol’s number because I know how much you hate to talk on the phone.” Tony is eating some sort of gelato or frozen yogurt, and he hasn’t taken his eyes off the screen the entire time. Natasha smiles in his direction, folding her arms over her chest and giving a nod.

“Thanks. We’re just kinda waiting for the go-ahead from the label about it. Keep your fingers crossed for us.” She grabs a spring roll from the take-out carton and stuffs one end in her mouth.

“Grab some chopsticks and come hang out,” Clint says, sounding exactly as distracted as he is. “Roman Reigns is about to kick some ass.”

“I think I want to just go hide in my bed.” She kicks her boots off and glances over to find Bucky watching her, a concerned frown on his face. She gives him a tired smile before heading for the stairs and her room. She strips down to her tank and panties again, just settling into bed before there’s a soft knock on the door. 

“C’mon in, Bucky.”

He appears in a movement of flannel, greasy hair, and sympathetic smiles, holding up fat joint for Natasha to see immediately.

“You wanna?”

Natasha makes grabby hands at him, and he joins her on the bed and passes the joint over while she digs a lighter out of her nightstand. The first drag is heaven, and she leans back against the headboard, holding her breath until she feels light-headed, only exhaling when she absolutely has to. She passes it over to Bucky after a smaller drag, letting him pull the covers up over them after they’ve smoked the blunt nearly all the way down, the whole room warm and hazy now.

“Know what I thought about today?” Bucky takes one last hit before handing it off to Natasha to finish it off, and his eyes are just as tired as hers, red-rimmed and bright blue and not meeting her own. He doesn’t look anybody in the eyes except Steve, hasn’t since they were all kids, and she’s learned to be okay with that.

“Hm?”

“Remember when we used to play jump rope down at Steve’s house? And you’d always want us to go faster and faster until you got tripped up and fell down?”

Natasha smirks as she pushes to lie back against the bed, pulling on Bucky to do the same. He rests his cheek against her breasts and wraps his arms around her waist, and her fingers settle into the soft, dirty mess of his hair.

“I didn’t want you to go faster so I _would_ fall, buttface. I just… knew I could do better.”

“Steve’s ma’d get so pissed at us. It took all three of us cryin’ to make sure she didn’t call Mrs. Blatov.” Bucky falls quiet then and Natasha forces herself not to tense up, the pot going a long way in helping with that. The Blatovs fostered Bucky and Natasha along with four other kids for the better part of ten years, and the good memories they have about their time there are very few and overshadowed by everything else that happened.

She gives Bucky a squeeze, tucking her face into his hair and breathing in the familiar scent of him while she kisses his head.

“Steve wouldn’t’ve let that happen, would he? He always looked out for us.”

“Yeah,” Bucky says softly, just a warm exhale against Natasha’s skin. “Always has.”

 

It’s pitch-black in the room when another knock on the door sounds, and Natasha opens her eyes, blinking into the darkness while Bucky snores on her chest.

“Yeah?”

“It’s me. Darcy’s on the phone for you.”

“Come in, Steve.” She hurries to sit up without jostling Bucky, reaching over to turn on the lamp. Steve comes into view still wearing his scrubs, his broad shoulders drooping with exhaustion, but he’s still smiling when he hands her the phone.

“Was wonderin’ where he was,” he says softly, toeing off his shoes and slipping into the bed behind Bucky, spooning up behind him and hugging Bucky back against his chest in a way that makes Natasha ache, just the way they always have. There’s a completeness there that she’s never seen anywhere else, never had for herself to understand. But she’s always been grateful that Bucky has it.

“Hey, Darce,” she says into the phone, scooting over to one side of the bed to make room for the two grown-ass men she’s currently sharing with. “What’s up?”

“What the fuck, Nat? I’ve been calling you for hours! I texted you, I left you like--”

“Can you get to the point? I’ve had a long day.” She leans back against the headboard and closes her eyes, still stoned and so her mind drifts, floating wonderfully until she’s nearly back asleep before she even gets the last word out.

“--on tour!”

Natasha’s eyes snap open, and she’s staring across the room at her bookcase.

“Uh,” she starts, breath caught in her throat, heart already racing. “What?”

“I said, we’re going on tour! Nat, _we’re fucking going on fuckin’ tour!_ Carol got a call from Fury right after we left practice. It’s not gonna be huge or anything, but like ten cities across the States? And we’re leaving in two goddamn weeks!” Darcy is so excited that her voice is trembling, and Natasha knows without a doubt that she’s probably dancing, wherever she is.

She just stares off helplessly, stunned into a speechless, stoned stupor. Steve lifts his head from where it was tucked into the back of Bucky’s neck, his face pulled tight with concern.

“Nat? Everything alright?”

“Y-Yeah,” she manages, not looking over at him. She blinks again.

“Carol got a call from that guy Tony knows. Vision or something?” Darcy continues. “He wants to meet with us tomorrow, so she told him to come by your place at six because it’s the least shitty one of all of ours, okay?”

“Sure, Darce,” Natasha breathes.

“Six o’clock, don’t forget! We’ll practice after.”

“Yeah. Yeah, that’s--”

“We’re going on tooooooour!” Darcy hangs up with no ceremony, leaving Natasha holding a phone cradled to her shoulder and her life altered.

“Tash?” Bucky’s hand is on her arm, gentle and cautious.

“We’re… we’re going on tour.”

 

\--

By 5:55, Natasha is dressed in her best t-shirt and is pacing the foyer barefoot, chewing on her already short nails and wondering where the fuck everybody else is.

“Nat, you’re freakin’ me out,” Sam informs her from the living room where he is typing away on his laptop, probably working on his novel or something. 

“Sorry,” she sighs, coming to a stop and folding her arms over her chest. “This is just… a big fucking deal, you know? And I don’t know why nobody else is here! Am I the only one who--”

The doorbell rings.

“Thank fuck.” She yanks the door open and is faced with the rest of her band who is beaming at her, all of them looking like they’re about to jump out of their skin with excitement. Nat lowers her eyes in a sudden fit of bashfulness, her grin hidden. “So… Pussy Party takes on America, huh?”

“Or at least the Northeast,” Carol replies as she steps into the room, her voice hoarse but she’s grinning like a kid at Christmas. “I can’t believe it’s finally happening.”

“Well, we’ve gone on tour before.” Sif sits down on the arm of the couch right next to Sam, missing the way he blinks up at the intrusion of her ass in his workspace. “It was just… awful.”

“A nightmare,” Darcy corrects, linking arms with Natasha and resting her cheek on her shoulder. She’s still so soft, her curls falling over Natasha’s bare arm, the side of her breast pillowed against Nat’s bicep. God, she misses those tits.

“This’ll be better. We’ll have a manager. It won’t just be you calling venues and threatening them until they book us.” Carol sits on the coffee table, her long legs sprawled out in front of her.

“Hey! I didn’t threaten!” Darcy tenses up defensively. “I just… suggested.”

“I don’t think the police consider death threats ‘suggestions,’ babe,” Nat says softly against her ear. Darcy grins up at her.

“Not my fault I’m too badass.”

“Oh, please. You’re a marshmallow.” Sam doesn’t stop typing to make his observation, just smirks at his screen when they all turn to look at him. Darcy sits up from her snuggle into Natasha, puffing up like a little bird.

“A marshmallow covered in _thorns_!” 

“See, Darce? This is why we don’t let you write songs.” Carol winks at her when Darcy glares. The doorbell rings again, and they all jump up and gather together, hands seeking each other out.

“Carol, you should get it.”

“Why me? I sound like I have a disease!”

“You’re the leader!”

“What?! No, I’m not! This isn’t Josie and the Pussycats, Darce.”

“But you’ve already--”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake.” Sam stands up and marches over to the door after he puts his laptop on the coffee table, bypassing all of them and opening the door to reveal a guy in wayfarers and a bomber jacket standing next to a girl who seems to be made up of raven-red hair and lowered gazes. “Hi. Welcome. C’mon in.”

“Hello! I’m Vision--” The guy stops when Sam just retreats back to his paper or novel or love letter to Clint Barton. Carol steps forward in spite of her words from only a minute before, a smile stretching over her beautiful face no matter how sick she really is.

“Hi, I’m Carol Danvers. We spoke on the phone? It’s so nice to meet you, Vision!” They shake hands, and Natasha watches with raised eyebrows as Carol introduces the guy to Sif and Darcy, everyone seeming to ignore the girl practically hidden behind the Vision guy. 

When he gets to Natasha, he blinks a couple of times before he takes Natasha’s reluctantly offered hand and shakes it.

“Brilliant. Just brilliant.” His British accent is crisp and professional, his smile so perfect it looks painted on. He pushes his sunglasses up on top of his carefully tousled dark head after he lets go of Natasha’s hand, settling his hands on his hips and surveying the four of them with his bleached-white smile. “Pussy Party. That’s quite a name.”

“No false advertisement here. It’s on the tin.” Darcy shrugs, folding her arms under her breasts. Natasha watches Vision’s gaze snap right on them, and she moves into his field of… well, _vision_ to draw his eyes from Darcy.

“Right. Well, of course. We listened to your album on the way over. Didn’t we, Wanda? It’s loud. That’s quite an instrument you’ve got there, Carol.” He pulls his phone out after it vibrates in his pocket, his thumb moving over the screen.

“Yeah.” Carol gives an awkward laugh, glancing over at Natasha, Darcy, and Sif. She looks at Wanda instead of Vision who’s tucked his phone away again, stepping closer to the girl and offering her hand. “Hey. Carol.”

“Oh, I apologize! I always forget. This is Wanda Maximoff. She’s my girl.” He steps to the side so Darcy and Sif can shake her hand. Natasha looks the girl over as she does, taking in her slouchy cardigan, her pale hands, and her downcast eyes. She nearly glares at Vision for how dismissive he is of her, but she recovers in time to shake Wanda’s hand herself.

“You can call me Nat,” she tells the girl just to watch one side of her scarlet-red mouth lift up in a shy smile.

“Listen, girls, I’ve got big plans! Alright, so a 10-city tour. We’ll start here in Brooklyn, and then to Hartford and Providence and--Wanda, give them the paper. You remembered to bring it, right?”

Wanda seems to want to glare at him but thinks better of it as she files through the stack of papers clutched in her arm and hands one of them to Carol. The other girls crowd around it, reading through the list of cities while Vision continues to talk.

“I talked to the label. The budget is completely atrocious, so this is going to be a _very_ humble tour. We’ll be traveling by van, staying in motels, and the food budget per day for each of you is twenty dollars. We’ll have two rooms with two queen beds each, which is enough for two girls per bed in one room with the other one left for the crew. I’ve got a list of people willing to work--”

“We’ve got the roadies taken care of. We want ladies. Plus, we have a bus being loaned to us. It’s a refurbished school bus some of our schoolie friends are going to let us borrow.” Darcy puts her hands on her hips to mirror Vision’s stance, several inches shorter than him but looking just as in control with her raised eyebrows and her dark red mouth. 

Vision looks between all of them and gives an uncomfortable bark of laughter.

“You want birds to load instruments and set up and work sound? Really? I know a couple of guys who are former bodybuilders who could carry all your instruments in one go.” 

“We want women,” Natasha repeats for Darcy, her voice low and even. “I promise, it’ll be fine.”

Vision stares at her for the longest time, his expression one of thinly-veiled, threatened disdain. 

“There’s no insurance included on this,” he informs her, the side of his mouth twitching with a smirk. “Broken arms, broken fingers, broken nails. It’s all on you.”

“Carol’s a former nurse. She can reset bones,” Natasha shoots back. “And I promise, all of us have short nails.”

Vision snorts, glancing over at Sam in the living room for the first time, looking for some male support.

“Why would girls need--”

“Lesbians, man,” Sam says to Vision from across the room. “You better start learnin’ about lesbians. And bring some testosterone pills if you’re already feelin’ threatened.”

Wanda smiles for the first time, a light dancing in her eyes that has been absent this whole time. She writes something in the Moleskine on top of the papers in her grasp, the sound of her pen scratching the only sound heard while Vision takes that information in and adjusts his masculinity. Natasha watches with relish.

“Are you telling me I’m going to be the only man on this tour?” Vision sounds lost for the first time, his hands dropping to his sides, his eyes blue and wide.

“Is that going to be a problem?” Sif speaks up for the first time, her just-as-British voice intimidating Vision into sputtering a reply.

“Of course not! Of course not. I was just--”

“I have some questions for you,” Natasha interrupts. Vision blinks at her, plastering on his toothpaste smile again. 

“Ah, sure, Nat.”

“Call me Natasha.”

“Sure, sweetheart.” Vision’s eyes flash, challenging. Natasha grits her teeth. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Bucky and Thor shuffle into the room, armed with sandwiches and staying uncharacteristically quiet.

“First off, what’s your real name?”

Vision’s smile wavers but doesn’t fall away somehow.

“I’m sorry?”

“I mean, unless you popped out of your mom’s cooze and she said ‘my oh my, Stanley, isn’t he just a _vision_?’ and it fucking stuck, you have another name. An actual name.”

Everything is quiet except the TV that Thor just turned on. Vision stares at Natasha with his mouth open, seemingly amazed that anyone would dare to talk to him like that.

“Simon,” he mutters, his voice flat. “My name’s Simon.”

“Cool. Second, Simon, we aren’t even really sure if we’ve hired you yet.”

He looks very close to snapping at her. He glances back at Wanda who has her eyes down on her notebook, his hands balling into fists.

“Might I ask why?”

“Just in case you haven’t noticed, we’re an all-girl band. A _queer_ all girl band.”

He blinks at her.

“...And?”

“ _And_ , historically, we have a really low-tolerance for men.” She has no problem saying it, doesn’t even really feel bad at how nervous Wanda looks now, how much she’s backed up so that she’s pressed against the door, as uninvolved in the whole conversation as she can be. Sif, Carol, and Darcy are just looking on, back and forth as Simon and Natasha talk.

Simon looks over into the livingroom where there are now two more men than there were before.

“So, these guys here are just props?”

Natasha glances over at them, catching Bucky’s grinning face.

She shrugs at Simon.

“Mostly. Some of them give good foot massages. Do you give good foot massages?”

Vision’s face is very red, and he has his phone out again, fumbling around with it even though Natasha can very clearly see that no one has texted him.

“Well, we’re going now. I just wanted to introduce myself. Carol invited me to your practice tomorrow at 6pm. I will see you then. C’mon, Wanda.”

He grabs hold of Wanda’s arm in a way that makes Natasha see red, but Wanda turns to give them all a smile and a quick wiggle of her fingers as a goodbye before she’s pulled outside. 

The band stays where they are, staring at the closed door for a long moment, none of them speaking.

“Alright, who wants to start a pool for how long it’ll take Nat to castrate that guy?” Clint speaks up from where he’s now on the couch, his head resting on Bucky’s thigh.

Natasha sighs.

“Carol--”

“Nat, we’ve gotta hire him. We leave in less than two weeks, and he knows what he’s doing. Do you remember last time? Do you remember sleeping in the parking lot of the bus station in Memphis?”

“There’s got to be--”

“He’s giving us a great deal because he knows Tony. We can _afford_ him, Nat.” Carol drags herself over to the couch and curls up against Thor’s big, warm body. He pushes thick fingers into her bleach blonde pixie cut and scritches her head comfortingly. “Have some pity on me. I’m running a fuckin’ fever.”

Natasha looks over at Sif and Darcy who have their eyes averted, telling Natasha that the decision is up to her and Carol. She rubs her hands over her face and sighs into her palms.

“Fine,” she groans, lowering her hands, her eyeliner smudged now. “But if I have to kill him, y’all are helping me hide the body.”


	2. pretty girls all gather round

“Excuse me! Excuse me.”

Natasha holds the chord for as long as possible, letting it reverberate out of the speaker while she narrows her eyes at Simon, gum smacking around in her mouth just to be annoying.

Carol beats her to being the first one to reply.

“Is there a reason you just interrupted us in the middle of a song?”

“Can’t you find any more energy than this? I thought you guys were going to melt my fucking face off!” Simon is texting while he talks, eyes flitting back and forth between Carol and his phone. Carol waits him out, doesn’t speak until she has his full attention, and then she raises one perfect, deadly sharp eyebrow.

“I have the flu right now. The girls are going easy on me until I get my voice back. Is that a problem?”

Natasha smirks, spreading her gum over the surface of her tongue and blowing three tiny bubbles that she pops in quick succession, _snap-snap-snap._ She glances up and finds Wanda sitting on an amp near Simon, an iPad on her lap, looking lost. It annoys the shit out of her suddenly that this random person is just here, for no reason, with no role in this whole circus to begin with. That Simon thinks he’s in fucking control here.

“Well, actually--” Simon starts, taking a step toward Carol.

“What’s she doing here?” Natasha doesn’t take her eyes off of Wanda, not even when Wanda looks up; bright green eyes finding her own, looking terrified and even more lost than before. Everyone else follows Natasha’s gaze until all eyes are on Wanda. 

Her pretty face is blood red.

“She’s my assistant,” Simon snaps, lifting a hand to pinch the bridge of his nose. “not that it’s any of your--”

“I thought you said she was your girlfriend.” Natasha raises her eyebrows at Wanda, daring her to speak for herself. Come to think of it, Natasha can’t even recall having heard her speak.

“What, she can’t be both?”

Natasha finally looks over at him.

“Is she?”

The sing-songy jangle of Simon’s ringtone interrupts them. he sighs, heavy and dramatic, lifting his phone to point it first at Natasha and then at Carol.

“I’ve got to take this. You need to start taking each and every practice seriously. We hit the road in two weeks from tomorrow.” He presses the phone to his ear. “Talk to me.”

“This is a fucking joke,” Sif informs them from behind the drum kit. She stands up and tucks her drumsticks in her back pocket, pulling out a pack of cigarettes as she weaves her way through the cords. “I’m taking a break.”

“I’m gonna go call Jane,” Darcy sighs, propping her bass on the stand and speaking to Carol and not Natasha. “I get the feeling i’m not going to be home in time for dinner.”

Natasha grits her teeth at the reminder of Jane’s existence, lifting her eyes just in time to exchange a look with Carol. She adds in a shrug as she forces neutrality onto her face.

“Sure, Darce.” Carol coughs into her hoodie-covered hand, turning to Natasha when Darcy shuffles off. “Hey Nat, do you think Steve would make me some tea?”

“If he’s home yet. You can go upstairs and check. If not, get Bucky to. He plays a pretty good nurse, too.” She shoves a hand into her short, messy hair, trying to give Carol a smile that falls flat. Carol squeezes her arm as she walks past, and Natasha realizes about ten seconds too late that she’s now left alone with the assistant, the mute girlfriend.

Wanda.

Wanda who is wearing kick-soft dark red Docs and tight, faded jeans, whose hair is dragged up in a messy wad at the top of her head and who is watching Natasha from under her lashes like she just can’t help it, like she’s waiting to be yelled at.

It makes Natasha tired.

“Just so I know: you _can_ speak, right?” Natasha plays absently, pick dragging soft but sure over the strings. The guitar is cold on her naked stomach where it’s exposed under her cropped shirt, her tits hanging soft and braless, feet bare on the concrete floor of the practice room that Tony has so graciously let them have. Wanda squirms, curls in even more onto herself.

“I can speak.” 

Wanda’s voice is dark, low and honeyed in a way Natasha wasn’t expecting. She watches her for several long beats, the song she’s playing growing slower, moodier. 

“What, he just doesn’t let you? Not while he’s talking, right? Which is always, let’s be real.” Natasha stops playing and watches her, watches her fidget with loose strands of dark hair and let her heavy boots clunk together at the toe. 

“He’s just busy,” Wanda defends with a shrug, looking at the iPad now and not Natasha, a frown pulling at her lovely face. And it is, Natasha can’t help but notice, a lovely face. “He’s got a lot going on. He works his ass off.”

“And what about you? Don’t you have anything better to do than to put his appointments into iCal while he monologues?” She pulls the guitar from over her head and sets it on the stand, and she can’t help but notice the way Wanda’s eyes follow the movement, the way they seem to settle on her tits. it makes her want to look down at them herself, to maybe tug her tiny shirt up the few inches required to show Wanda what’s underneath. 

But she refrains and pads across the cold floor and stands just a few feet in front of her, her arms folding just under her breasts, eyes narrowed as she waits for an answer.

Wanda laughs, a humorless breath, one side of her full mouth tugged up into a wry smile.

“I’m in college, so yeah. I’ve got a shit-ton of work to do. I’m studying for finals right now, and I have a paper due--”

“Then go home.” Natasha shrugs, simple. “Just leave. Do it now, before he gets back.”

Wanda just blinks at her, her already big eyes absolutely massive.

“But… what if he needs me to--”

He’s a big boy,” Natasha assures her, keeping her tone as casual and flippant as she can before Wanda completely loses her nerve. “I’ll tell him. Just go.”

“I just don’t think--”

“Go.” it’s an order, in a tone she usually reserves for girls she’s fucking who like to be ordered around and Clint when he’s driving her insane. Wanda reacts to it pretty fucking perfectly, springing to life and sliding down from the speaker, snatching her bag up off the ground and tucking the iPad in it.

They watch each other for a few long seconds before Natasha can’t stand the eye contact anymore and has to look away, glancing around and wishing desperately for somebody else to magically appear in the room. 

“Thanks,” Wanda says from the doorway, her voice small. Natasha looks up at her and lifts an eyebrow.

“For what? Telling you what to do, just like he does?”

Wanda pauses, her face falling, her knuckles turning white where she grips her bag. She turns and leaves without another word, and Natasha lets out a huge breath she didn’t realize she’d been holding. 

Fucking breeders.

“Nat, Bucky said he’s making some of those pizza bite things you like!” Carol’s scratchy voice echoes down the stairs and Natasha follows the sound of it immediately, relieved for the promise of greasy, processed food and the distraction from the guilt settling low in her gut for putting that look in Wanda’s bright eyes.

\--

 

It’s three days later, and Natasha still feels like shit about it.

Wanda is at practice once again, but she looks even less like she wants to be here than she did the other day. She’s tucked on top of one of the big, expensive speakers Tony had way too much fun buying for the band, her laptop curled on top of her legs, books all around her, her eyes decidedly down. She hasn’t said a word to anyone.

Natasha almost goes over at least twice only to stop herself both times and return to her station in front of her mic. She’s never been good at apologizing. Not even when she got Steve in trouble in the sixth grade and he got suspended for two days because of her. The _sorry_ only came years later, when they were both tipsy and curled up with Bucky between them. Steve had accepted because he’s a good person, much better than Natasha will ever be.

Practice is going surprisingly well, all things considered. Carol is slowly on the mend, her voice regaining its trademark growl as they run through songs, a fact that has Simon, to the surprise of _everyone_ , amazingly pleased.

They take a break after a run-through of five songs, everyone running to their usual corners: Carol upstairs for hot tea and probably food, Darcy off to call Jane, and Sif outside to smoke and get away from everyone.

Natasha is left once again with Wanda, but this time she has no idea what to say to her. She takes her time putting her guitar on its stand, checking her phone and responding to a stupid text from Clint before she gathers the courage to shuffle over to Wanda typing away on her computer, her eyes trained on the screen, decidedly ignoring Natasha. Natasha has to admit she’s pleased and a little impressed because it looks like Wanda is actually doing her homework.

She takes a deep breath, stuffs her hands in her pocket, and clears her throat a little.

“Hey, uh. Can I talk to you for a minute? It’ll just take a second. I know you’re busy--”

“No, it’s okay.” Wanda clicks a few more things and closes her laptop, those eyes finding Natasha and Wanda bursts out laughing when they do, her cheeks flushing hot.

Natasha just blinks at her.

“What? What’d I do?”

Wanda lifts her pen and gestures at Natasha’s shirt, a smile twitching on her lips.

“Your shirt. It’s just…”

Natasha looks down at her shirt that proudly reads VAGITARIAN with a cat peeking over the words. She smirks and lifts her eyes to Wanda, going for sultry but she’s too amused to pull it off.

“Yeah? You like it?”

Wanda just nods, averting her eyes shyly but she’s still smiling. Natasha watches her, pleased with how flustered she seems, with how bashful she’s acting right now. 

It’s kind of fucking hot.

“Why do you like it?” Natasha takes a few steps closer to where Wanda is perched on the speaker but not close enough to hide the shirt. she’s definitely going for sultry now.

“It’s red,” Wanda finally answers, after what seems to be careful consideration, and the playful smirk on her lips makes Natasha smile.

“Because it’s red. Do you like red?”

Wanda nods emphatically now, the pen twirling and twisting between her graceful fingers.

“It’s my favorite color. I wear something red every single day.”

Natasha hums, looking her over, trying to spy the red article of the day and suddenly she sees it: a blood red garnet set into silver, big and oval on Wanda’s left forefinger.

“The ring,” she says, quiet, her eyes on it, noting how old it looks, the way it swallows Wanda’s small finger. Wanda looks down, twisting it around as she bites into her bottom lip.

“It was my mom’s. Don't have much of hers, but I always loved this ring. It was her birthstone.”

“A January baby, huh?” She wants to touch the ring for some reason, to put her fingers on the stone to see if it’s as cool as it looks, to touch Wanda’s skin immediately after to see just how warm she is in comparison.

Wanda smiles, the look in her eyes light years away from the dull sadness Natasha had put there a few days ago.

“Yeah. And I was born in March.” Wanda pauses like she’s thinking, like she’s maybe a million miles away from here. But then she returns, finds Natasha’s eyes again. “What about you? When were you born?”

“Ah.” Natasha tenses up the way she always does when she has to think about herself, when she has to answer something even remotely personal. But she can give Wanda this, this small, harmless fact. “November.”

“Ahh,” Wanda nods knowingly, another smirk digging a dimple out on her cheek. “Scorpio. You are _such_ a Scorpio.”

Natasha raises her eyebrows.

“I am? Is that a good or bad thing?”

“Alright tíos, let’s get this over with. I’ve got a date tonight.” Carol saunters in and grabs up her mic while everyone else bustles in behind her. Natasha keeps her eyes on Wanda who smiles, settling back against the wall and grabbing her laptop again.

“I guess you’ll never know now.”

Natasha snorts, reaching up to tug at the bow on Wanda’s knee-high black boots before she walks backwards towards her guitar.

“You know, you can’t be mysterious when you have a hot pink ponytail holder in your pretty braid. True story.” She tugs the guitar over her body and adjusts the strap, having to hold in her smile at the scoffing laugh Wanda lets out.

“Watch me!”

“You look like a my little pony,” Natasha informs her, tugging a pick out of her pocket and playing a loud open G that burns and distorts from the speaker Wanda’s sitting on. Wanda looks offended for all of five seconds before she eases into that sweet thoughtful expression again, tapping her chin with her pen.

“I wonder what my cutie mark would be.”

Nat blinks at her.

“Your _what_?”

“C’mon fellas, back at it. Wanda, I thought you were busy?” Simon narrows his eyes at Wanda who shrinks again like it’s a fucking magic trick, all humor and brightness leaving her face as she opens her laptop, not responding to Simon when her fingers resume flying over the keyboard.

She doesn’t look at Natasha again.

 

Pussy Party pops the cherry of their Raise Pink Hell tour at home in Brooklyn at Trash Bar. Natasha yanks her guitar from over her head after the last song and raises it up by the neck as high as she can as a thank you to the deafening applause and yells of appreciation. She grins over at Carol whose eyes look like they’re on fire, who is beaming before she lets out a yell and hops on her feet a few times and then jumps into the crowd, landing on her feet like a cat.

Natasha wouldn’t admit it to many people, but performing in a packed, rowdy dive bar is better than sex.

She peels herself out of her leather jacket and drops it behind the bar with Rhodey who takes it with a grin and hands her a bottle of water and a bar towel. She accepts them both gratefully, downing the bottle of water and toweling herself off as she wades through the crowd to get to her crew tucked on the couches to the left of the stage.

“Nat!” Bucky approaches her first, flinging his arms around her neck, not caring about boob sweat or the fact that she stinks in her destroyed tanktop. She closes her eyes and returns the hug with everything she’s got, trying to calm the tremble she feels in Bucky just from being in a crowd like this.

“Thank you for coming, Buck,” she says quietly against his ear.

They’re piled on then by Thor and Loki and Tony and Sam and Clint and Steve, all of them getting in a squeeze or a pet or a sloppy, drunken kiss on her cheek. She lets herself relax finally, going boneless in their collective grip, savoring it.

She’s going to miss her family while she’s gone for the next month and a half.

“Natasha!”

The crisp British accent gives it away, and Natasha doesn’t even have it in her to be annoyed that he’s interrupting her hug. She pulls back from all the guys and turns to see Simon there, his hair freshly cut, sleeves pushed up to his elbows, a cigarette in his hand, and he is _beaming_ at her. 

“So good, babe,” he tells her, his eyes bright with honesty and joy. “So fuckin’ good.”

He yanks her into a hug that she accepts with a laugh, glancing over at Wanda who is there beside him wearing a short red velvet skirt, black tights and an oversized black sweater hanging off her shoulder. Her hair is pulled up in a messy, forgotten way, long tendrils sliding down her pale neck and around her face. Her mouth matches her skirt and her mom’s ring on her finger exactly, her green eyes rimmed heavily with kohl, and her eyes are on Natasha.

Natasha hugs Simon back distractedly, not even blinking as she and Wanda hold their gaze the whole time. Simon finally yanks her back and kisses her wetly on the forehead, giving a laugh that almost sounds euphoric.

“Introduce me to your friends properly! I’ve only met them in fits and spurts.”

Carol, Darcy, and Sif have joined them since then, and they go around in an imperfect unison introducing everyone until they get to Tony who hands Simon a beer and drags him away to talk excitedly about money and schedules and equipment and whatever else gives them boners.

Someone goes to the bar to get a round of drinks, and Natasha turns to Wanda with a suddenly timid smile.

“Wanna duck outside with me for a smoke?”

“Well, I don’t smoke, but I’ll go with you. If you don’t mind?” It seems difficult for Wanda to raise her voice to a volume needed to be heard in the lively bar, and Natasha feels suddenly protective of her. She reaches down and slides her fingers over Wanda’s soft hand, giving her forefinger a tug in a silent order to follow her.

Wanda hooks her finger into one of Natasha’s belt loops as they make their way through the thick, sweaty push of the crowd, not stopping until they practically burst outside into the blessedly breezy night, Brooklyn alive and bright around them, but it’s somehow quiet in comparison.

They don’t talk as they walk down the block a little and round the corner into the dark alley where the bus is parked, loaded and ready for them to leave tonight. Natasha lights up her Kamel Red and nearly moans with relief as she inhales, leaning back against the tired brick of the building and exhaling up into the night.

“You were… amazing up there,” Wanda says into the quiet. Natasha cracks an eye open and sees her standing a couple of feet away, nearly in the middle of the little alley, her face half-shadowed, her features soft with what seems to be residual shyness.

“It wasn’t too bad, huh? Guess all that practice really does pay off.” She takes another drag just so she can stop talking, antsy the way she always is when she gets compliments. “So hey, haven’t seen you for awhile. School been brutal?”

“Yeah,” Wanda sighs, reaching up to tuck her hair behind her ear before she starts to pace a little, not straying too far from Natasha at any given moment but it smacks of nervousness, of anxiety. Natasha watches her, eyes cutting down to the slow drag of Wanda’s massive black boots on the broken concrete. “Studying for finals. I feel like I’m drowning. Haven’t slept in what feels like a week.”

“And you came out tonight anyway?” Natasha lets her eyes drag indulgently up the soft curves of Wanda’s body to meet her eyes again, one of her eyebrows quirking.

Wanda shrugs, shy again, arms wrapping around herself as she tries to hide her smile.

“Wanted to see you in action. You guys have been working so hard. Just wanted to support you.”

“Well, thanks. I know there’s a lot you’d rather be doin’ right now. It means a lot.” She takes another drag, her fingers itching to reach for Wanda, to stop her pacing, to draw her in, calm her down, let her fucking sleep. “So, you’re not joining us on the tour, Ms. Assistant?”

Wanda tries to glare at her but it just comes out as a grin. She lifts a foot and nudges at Natasha’s leg, leaving a dusty print on her tight black jeans.

“Next week. Finals are Monday and Tuesday. I’ll see you guys in Boston.”

“Mm.” Nat flicks her cigarette, letting her tongue drag over her bottom lip, not averting her eyes from Wanda as she thinks it over. “I’m taking you out for the biggest burger we can find, and you are sleeping for at least eight hours when you get there. Got it?”

“Yes ma'am.” Wanda grins and finally takes a step closer, reaching into the little purse she has hanging off her right shoulder and pulling out a long silver chain with a few things dangling from the bottom. She presses it into Natasha’s hand. “Made you something.”

Natasha puts her cigarette out on the wall and tucks the rest of it behind her ear. She brings the necklace up close so she can see it in the low light, trying to see every tiny detail and also trying very hard to keep her heart from racing for the sweetness of the gesture.

“What is it?” She finally looks up at Wanda, catching the nervousness tugging at her before Wanda schools her face.

“A necklace,” Wanda says with a cheeky grin, and it’s Natasha’s turn to nudge her with her foot.

“C’mon.” She pushes away from the wall and steps in close to Wanda, letting the moonlight overhead find them so she can see the trinkets better. “Tell me.”

“It’s a protection talisman,” Wanda explains, her voice soft, just as timid as that first day at practice. “For traveling.”

Natasha searches those lovely eyes that look liquid in the light of the moon as she pulls the necklace over her head and lets it rest in her cleavage for just a second before she lifts it again, holding the little charms up.

“Tell me what they mean?”

“Promise you won’t make fun of me,” Wanda says first, her tone teasing but her face is serious. Natasha’s smile softens.

“I promise.”

Wanda’s deft, graceful fingers come up to hold on to the charms Natasha is holding up, separating one from the rest and running the pad of her thumb over it.

“A compass. To keep you on your intended path and to make sure you return home.” She lifts up what looks like a river stone with a hole in it but the hole looks natural instead of drilled. “A hag stone, for protection.” 

A tiny glass vial is next, packed to the top with what looks like dried herbs and chips of crystals. “A travel protection amulet with… well. A lot of stuff in it.” Wanda lifts a big, smooth drop of deep red stone, rubbing her thumb over it like she had the compass, her voice falling into something soft and thoughtful. “And a piece of garnet. To keep you grounded and safe during travels, and--”

“And to remind me of you,” Natasha finishes in a hush, keeping the words low and just for Wanda. Those big eyes find her again as Wanda lets the necklace fall, the charms tinkling together when they land against Natasha’s breasts. Wanda chews on her bottom lip, her eyes lowering to the necklace, unaware of how fast Natasha’s heart is beating.

“If you want,” Wanda finally says, her arms going behind her, her hands probably twisting up adorably behind her back. She looks so beautiful, so soft, so sweet and exhausted and open. And she belongs to someone else.

Natasha swallows, lifting the necklace again, the metal and the stones still warm from Wanda’s hands.

“So, are you a witch?”

Wanda seems to hesitate but she finally nods, taking a step back so she can look up at Natasha properly, without all of that distracting intimacy of being so close.

“Don’t worry,” she rushes out, a smirk tugging at her lovely mouth. “I didn’t put a curse on you or anything.”

“Did you charge these or whatever you call it? Put a protection spell on them?” Natasha lets the necklace fall again and forces herself to stay where she is, not to step up against Wanda again. It’s not safe. Not her place to do. She hears the door to the club open, spilling out a bright burst of sound before clattering closed again. She can hear Simon and Tony laughing and talking.

Wanda nods again, hands falling to her sides where they tuck up into her long sleeves, lost there just like Bucky likes to do.

“Thanks,” Natasha murmurs, desperate to hold onto their quiet moment for as long as she can. She can hear the sound of expensive boots approaching. “I’ll wear it every day.”

She glances back toward the mouth of the alleyway, reaching out to wrap her hand around Wanda’s wrist, giving it a little squeeze.

“Hey, c’mon. Let’s go in the back way. There’s somebody I want you to meet. I think you’ll get along.”

 

They leave Brooklyn around one in the morning, the bus pulling out noisily onto the now quiet street. The goodbyes had been bittersweet and light, and the last thing Natasha saw before embarking had been Wanda standing next to Bucky and Steve, their three smiles matching almost exactly and meant for Natasha.

She gets a text almost an hour later after she’s changed into her t-shirt and boxers and sprawled out in one of the amazingly comfy beds on the repurposed school bus. It’s Bucky.

_i like her nat. she’s kind of amazing._

She smiles just as sweetly as she wants here in the dark, reaching up to trace her fingers over the necklace, over the garnet stone. No one else in the band had gotten a necklace or even just a charm. Not even Simon, she thinks.

_i thought you might like her. kindred souls and all that_

_i meant i like her for you_

Natasha sighs, tucking back down against her pillow, Van Morrison playing quietly in her ears through her headphones as they ramble down the interstate with Maria, their sound tech, at the wheel.

_she’s taken, buck. it’s out of the question. not to mention she's probably 115% straight_

She keeps typing, her chest aching just from entertaining the notion, from the possibility. She doesn’t _do_ relationships, or sweetness, or fondness. Damnit.

_i’m gonna get some rest. check in on her this weekend, okay? let me know if she’s sleeping and taking care of herself._

She watches the bubble of Bucky typing out a reply.

_me & steve’ll watch out for your girl. ;) sleep well<3_

Natasha turns off her screen after they say goodnight and tucks her phone against her chest, closing her eyes and focusing on the music again, trying to quiet her racing mind, the pull apart the jumble of her thoughts so she can sleep.

“She’s not my girl,” she mumbles into the dark. 

"Oh sweet thing, sweet thing. My, my, my, my, my sweet thing," Van Morrison whispers back.


	3. blessed undone

Being on the road isn’t foreign or familiar. It's just new enough to be exciting, even the really unglamorous things like pissing in dirty gas station bathrooms with no doors on the stalls and eating oatmeal raisin pies for breakfast and shaving your pits at McDonald’s after stuffing your face with Chicken McNuggets.

The road is bad for Natasha and she knows it, knows it and fucking relishes it. There’s a certain freedom to it, a vacation from her actual life, from the ever-present, protective eye of Steve Rogers and the almost heart-breaking daily struggles Bucky still endures to the infuriating monotony of working retail and being paid to deal with people in all of their idiotic glory. On the road she can drink when she wants, party as hard as she wants, fuck whoever she wants, eat whatever shitty food she wants, and be completely unaccountable for her actions except for the two hours every three nights when she’s required up onstage under hot lights with her beat-up ESP draped over her tired body.

It’s beautiful. It’s hell. It could never last, because she couldn’t survive it for too long.

Hartford is lovely and quaint and looks like it belongs on the _Gilmore Girls_. Sully’s Pub looks like a mom-and-pop joint until the scrappy kids start to show up around nightfall, armed with piercings and a carefully curated appearance of looking like they don’t care as much as they do (and they do care; a wonderful, tragic amount). 

Natasha shreds so hard and so fucking amazingly that she breaks all but two strings on her guitar and slices her finger clean open on one of them; blood flying right along with the sweat because who fucking cares, what the fuck does it matter when there’s _music_ , music, music.

The AS220 in Providence feels like some kind of punk church when the lights go down and the music starts up. It’s the most spiritual moment of Natasha’s life up on that tiny stage, in front of those writhing, desperate kids who need the music just as much as she does, just as much as she did when punk rock saved her life, when she was too young to do anything but keep her head above water and try to survive being a teenager and not in control of her own life. 

She calls Bucky crying afterwards, her hands shaking from catharsis, memories leaving her mouth in shudders and gasps, in the do-you-remembers and I-wish-I-could-forgets of their childhood. She clutches her necklace in her hand so hard the compass pierces her palm, and she wishes she had Wanda’s phone number because she wants to tell her things, she wants to overshare her soul with her, right now when she feels broken open and desperate to be understood.

She drinks instead, throws back whiskey until she’s sprawled out prone on her bed on the bus, staring at the glow-in-the-dark stars on the ceiling and wishing Boston were closer.

On the way there, Sif outdrinks six truckers and wins fifty dollars in the process. For twenty bucks and a flash of her tits, Darcy gets a tattoo of a heart with an admittedly lovely J scrawled in it from a guy named Razzle. 

They check into a motel once they get to Boston, one complete with air conditioning and a pool and beds with covers on them that look straight out of Three’s Company. Natasha hangs out in the cramped room while the other girls go out in search of food and somewhere to cause some ruckus while they’re here.

Wanda’s bus gets in soon.

She corners Simon by the soda machine near the pool, trying to look casual and bored as he straightens out a dollar bill for a root beer.

“You going to get Wanda from the bus station?” 

Simon grunts around his cigarette while he feeds the bill to the machine, squinting to see through all the pennies in his palm for the quarters and dimes. Natasha holds in a sigh and leans over to help him. She digs through the coins in his palm and hands him a quarter and three dimes that he feeds to the machine.

“Nah, she can take a cab,” he tells her as the can tumbles toward the dispenser in the machine, cigarette between his fingers now, smoke billowing around them. Natasha wrinkles her nose. He smokes Dunhills that smell at once expensive and like piss. “Maria took the bus over to the body shop across the street to get the oil and filters changed.”

Natasha frowns for that, arms folding across her chest. Her careful neutrality fades away.

“What if she gets lost?”

Simon meets her eyes for the first time, popping the top of the can with one finger and giving her the most peculiar look before taking a sip.

“She’s a big girl. She’s not as helpless as she looks, I promise.”

“She doesn’t look helpless,” Natasha defends, her shoulders tensing up. “That’s not what I meant. Just…”

Simon lifts his eyebrows, waiting. Natasha sighs.

“Nevermind. Whatever.”

“Anyway,” Simon starts back toward the motel, calling back to talk to her over his shoulder. “I’m gonna go pass out. Go relax, Nat. We’ll all go out for a big dinner later. Anywhere you all wanna go.”

“We want steak and lobster!” She yells after him with a smile. He flips her off without turning to look and disappears into his room, the one he’ll share with Wanda when she gets here.

Not that he’s concerned.

 

In her determination to stay awake and be there when Wanda arrives, Natasha falls asleep.

She’s awakened by the sound of laughter and bags being dropped, and she opens her eyes to Darcy falling onto the bed beside her, all sweet and soft and smelling good in spite of the fact that she’s been living in a bus, just like Natasha has.

“Hey, sleepyhead,” Darcy says, her big blue eyes soft with affection as she reaches over to push Natasha’s hair back from her forehead. Natasha grunts, her hands stupid with sleep and reaching for Darcy, fingers sinking in greedy and proprietary where Darcy’s shirt is riding up along her back.

“Remember when you used to wake me up by giving me head?” Her voice is rough, pitched low with exhaustion and hunger, the tips of her fingers sliding into the back of Darcy’s skintight jeans.

“You liked to pretend you were choking me on your clit,” Darcy murmurs, her full mouth pulled into a smirk and she’s close, so close, like she’s going to lean down and kiss Natasha.

“My cock,” Natasha corrects, getting her fingers around the waist of Darcy’s panties and pulling up on them so they slide up her crack and her pretty pink slit. Darcy grits out a moan and runs her nose along Natasha’s jaw.

“Hi. We’re here. Just so you know,” Carol reminds them from a couple of feet away, her tits bare while she changes clothes. Sif is on the phone in the corner, speaking quietly, and Wanda is--

“Wanda.” Natasha sits up so fast that Darcy nearly falls off the bed. Her necklace almost strangles her where it’s hanging backwards on her neck. “Hey. Hi. When did you get here?”

Everything about Wanda is guarded, shut off. She’s wearing an oversized grey-blue shirt that serves as a dress with a sage green cardigan over top, soft brown leather sandals on her feet. Her hair is down in waves around her face that is a cloud, her wonderful mouth drawn tight. Her eyes are down.

“Just a little while ago,” Wanda mutters, pulling her phone out of her pocket. “We’re going out for dinner.”

“Yeah, so get dressed!” Darcy has recovered though her face is flushed, pupils blown. She has her phone out too, probably texting Jane to calm her guilty conscience. Natasha smirks.

 

They all pile into the Tasty Burger near Fenway Park, taking up two booths and stuffing their faces with burgers and fries smothered in sausage gravy and more beer than any respectable group of people would admit to consuming.

Natasha watches as Wanda orders a veggie burger from the other booth, along with tater tots and a Cheerwine. She’s quiet, maybe just tired, not laughing at any of the stupid jokes being told or contributing much to conversation. It eats at Natasha so much that she’s downright moody herself by the end of the night, and she tucks into a chair by the pool while most everyone else jumps in, most of them half-dressed and still drunk from dinner.

She tugs her boots off and curls up in the lounge chair, watching Carol dunk Kamala under every chance she gets while Darcy tries to show Sif how to do handstands in the water. Maria and Sharon look suspiciously intimate in the shallow end, both wearing just their bra and panties and pressed close, speaking quietly.

Natasha wonders how many of their whole group will end up fucking by the end of the tour.

Wanda comes out of the room she shares with Simon, wearing just her long t-shirt and no bra underneath, her feet bare. Her hair is a soft nest, her mouth deep red like it’s been sucked on, and she sinks bonelessly into the chair next to Natasha. She reaches over for Natasha’s cigarette without a word, taking a long drag before handing it back.

“I thought you didn’t smoke?” Natasha can’t take her eyes off of her, can’t really wrap her head around the fact that she’s real and she’s actually here.

Wanda shrugs, an almost secretive smile pulling at her mouth. She’s watching the girls in the pool as she draws her legs up, her thighs bare and smooth, and even here in the low light Natasha can see long, red lines that could only have come from a rough grip from hands.

She smells it on her then, the tell-tale mix of sweat and come that has Natasha’s nostrils flaring, her jealous, possessive instincts rising up almost unbearably high. She grits her teeth and looks away from her, both of them watching the antics in the pool. The tension between them is new, stifling.

Natasha knows that somehow, it’s her fault.

“How did finals go?”

“I survived,” Wanda sighs, head falling back against the chair. One of her feet slides down the length of it, elongating her calf, her toes pointing down. Natasha can’t help but watch out of the corner of her eye, tongue slipping out to wet her bottom lip. “Just barely.”

“That’s all that counts.” Natasha shifts in her seat, unusually fidgety, sprawling out like she’s got a big dick and she can’t sit any other way. She takes a long drag from the cigarette, tasting Wanda’s mouth on it. She exhales, glancing over at her, trying for a smile. “I’ve, um. Been wearing your necklace.”

She holds it up as proof, watching Wanda look over at it with a wan smile and a nod.

“Cool.”

A beat of silence passes, so awkward that Natasha nearly gets up, runs from it. The next words out of Wanda’s mouth are almost mean.

“So, how long have you and Darcy been together?”

Natasha’s eyebrows disappear into the mess of her hair that’s fallen over her forehead, her expression one of unfiltered surprise. She turns to look at Wanda.

“We’re not? Well, I mean. We used to be. But it was awhile ago. A couple of years.”

Just under one year ago, actually. But it sounds better, less important, when she puts more distance between then and now.

“She’s dating Jane now,” Natasha finishes, flicking her cigarette into the glass she’d snagged from the room. “They live together.”

Wanda doesn’t say anything to that, just keeps staring ahead, ignoring the splashes near her feet, the drunken laughter that is too loud for the mood surrounding the two of them.

“Hm,” she finally says.

“How long have you been with Simon?” It’s the natural follow-up question, the rebuttal, and Natasha turns entirely in her seat to wait for the answer. Wanda doesn’t flinch, but her beautiful mouth purses, her lashes lowering over her eyes as she looks down.

“A year and a half. Give me a cigarette?”

It’s a question instead of a demand, something that Natasha takes note of, appreciates. She passes Wanda the pack and watches her pluck one out and then dig out the lighter. Her cheeks hollow when she inhales, the flame lighting up her face in the near dark, casting her in an eerie glow that somehow suits her.

Natasha waits her out, lets her get a couple of drags in that come out on long, slow sighs. She can’t keep this up, this strange thing between them. It’s upsetting, almost as upsetting as those rare times when Bucky is mad at her.

“You look tired,” she tells Wanda softly.

Wanda finally meets her eyes, cheek pressed to the unforgiving plastic of the chair. Her smile is small, just for Natasha. They stay like that for a few precious seconds, watching and being watched.

“I’m exhausted. That kind of tired you feel in your bones. You know what I mean?”

“Intimately,” Natasha says.

The quiet is easier now, like something has been released. They stay just like that, facing each other, cigarettes burning slowly between their fingers. Natasha watches Wanda drift off to sleep, her limbs growing heavy, long lashes touching her cheeks. 

She’s the single most beautiful thing Natasha’s ever seen.

 

They leave for Philadelphia at dawn after the show a day and half later, everyone except for Sif who is on the first driving shift collapsing on their bed and falling immediately asleep. Natasha wakes up to the sight of Wanda sitting cross-legged on top of one of the unmade beds, curled down over what looks like Carol’s denim jacket with a needle and thread. 

“What’re you doin’?” Natasha mumbles, trying to be as quiet as she can because everyone else is sleeping blissfully around them. She sits up in her own bed and reaches up to pull the window above her open so she can light her cigarette and exhale the taste of sleep and tobacco. Better than coffee.

“Sewing,” Wanda whispers, giving a tug on the thread before piercing the denim with the needle again. “That asshole ripped Carol’s jacket last night. I told her I’d fix it.”

“I mean, why are you doing that instead of sleeping?”

Wanda doesn’t reply for a long moment. She shrugs and refocuses on her task, her hair pulled up and off her face, exposing the long line of her neck. She’s wearing a tanktop without a bra just like Natasha is, just like a lot of girls on the bus are, but on Wanda it’s tantalizing, bordering on pornographic. Natasha takes a hard draw off the cigarette.

“Couldn’t sleep, so I figured why not?”

She doesn’t ask her why she can’t sleep because she’s had to answer that question herself for most of her life and she fucking hates it. They stay like they are for a few, quiet minutes, Natasha smoking and Wanda sewing while Against Me! plays low over the speakers throughout the old school bus. It’s peaceful in the way silences have been between them lately, and Natasha nearly drifts back to sleep sitting up in her bed, her cigarette dangling from her fingers.

“How’s your hand?”

Natasha’s eyes snap open again at the question, wandering across the aisle at Wanda who hasn’t looked up at all. She glances down at her left hand, at the bandage across her knuckles that is spotted with a few faint splotches of blood. She’d gone after the guy who grabbed Carol, who ripped her jacket when she told him to choke on his own tiny dick. Natasha’d broken his nose with a single, solid left hook that had knocked him clean out. Apparently she’d also broken some of his teeth because her knuckles looked like they’d been chewed on, skin broken, blood gushing. She’d ignored the broken knuckle the way she used to when she would fight on the regular, just worried about getting bandaged up and getting the fuck out of Paradise Rock Club.

She wiggles her fingers a little, testing them out, gritting her teeth at the pain of moving her middle finger. She shrugs.

“I’ll live.”

“C’mere, let me look at it.” Wanda snips the little thread off after tying a couple of knots, and she puts what looks like a little sewing kit away and turns all of her attention to Natasha. Natasha who is smitten and horny and exhausted and can’t say no to a girl with tits like that. She flicks her cigarette out the window and stands up, her own nipples rock hard and visible in her white wifebeater as she makes her way over.

She sinks down onto Wanda’s mattress in her boys boxer briefs and barefeet and offers Wanda her hand, her eyes unblinking as she watches Wanda’s face.

“What, you a nurse, too?” One side of her mouth lifts in a playful smirk, nearly grinning when Wanda’s eyes meet her own.

“Not a nurse, smartass,” Wanda says with no heat as she turns to dig around in the worn leather bag at the foot of her bed. “Just a sister with a rowdy brother. I’ve patched up more wounds because of hot tempers than I can even count.”

“You a big sister?” Natasha settles back against the wall and lets Wanda work; careful fingers pulling off the bandage and the gauze beneath it and hissing in sympathy at Natasha’s swollen, busted knuckles.

“A twin. Are you sure this one isn’t broken?” Wanda runs her thumb over the middle knuckle and Natasha bites back a sound, trying to keep her face as neutral as possible.

“It’s fine,” she dismisses quickly, her fingers curling down to rest in Wanda’s soft palm. She suddenly realizes how intimate this is, how tender Wanda is being with her. It makes her ache in a few different places. “A twin, huh? Wow. So there’s a boy running around out there, looking just as pretty as you?”

The early morning sun doesn’t hide the pink that stains Wanda’s cheeks or the little smile that pulls on her sweet mouth. Natasha grins, biting down on her bottom lip as Wanda keeps her eyes lowered and cleans her knuckles.

“Well… we aren’t identical, so there are some differences. He quite literally is out there running around though. He’s at an Olympic training facility in Utah. He’s competing in the cross-country run in the next Olympics.” Wanda can’t keep the pride out of her voice, or the sadness. Natasha bypasses all of the usual things to say in response to that and goes right for the truth in it.

“You two are close.” It’s not a question.

“Very.” It sounds painful for Wanda to say. Her face closes up, the happiness leaving her expression while she dabs Neosporin very gently on Natasha’s knuckles. “Our mother was… she had problems. She overdosed when we were twelve, and so we went to an orphanage. We don’t have any family in the United States. It was just us. Well… there were a couple hundred kids, but… for us, we were alone.”

“I understand that,” Natasha almost whispers. Her throat is tight when she swallows, her free hand curled in her lap where she’s slouched against the wall. Her own childhood flashes through, evasive as a ghost but just as painful as if it happened yesterday. “I was raised in foster homes. Well… one, mainly. That’s where I met Bucky, when he was ten and I was nine. He’s… he’s like my brother. Steve is too, but it’s not the same.”

She pauses, glancing over at Wanda again while she wraps her knuckles back up.

“I’m sorry,” she says quietly. “That you’re away from him.”

“It’s supposed to be okay,” Wanda says with a humorless breath of laughter, fingers trembling a little as she tapes up the bandage. “Twins are supposed to live separate lives, just like any other brother and sister. It’s not supposed to hurt this much.”

She sounds angry at herself, like it’s a tired argument she’s had in her head countless times. Natasha gets that, too.

“Yeah. I know it’s not the same, but it’s really hard to be away from Bucky right now. He… he has a hard time, and I worry about him. I mean, he’s got Steve, and Steve’s always been there to take care of him, better than I ever could. I just.” Natasha shrugs tiredly, taking her newly bandaged hand back and glancing up at Wanda. “I get it.”

Wanda puts the first aid kit back in the bag with the sewing kit, taking her time in zipping it up and moving it to the little cubby next to her bed. She sighs as she settles back against the pillows, stretching out and draping her legs over Natasha’s lap.

Natasha looks down at her little socked feet peeking out from the bottom of her cotton sleep pants. She wonders if her toes are painted, and what color. She wonders if the bruises on her thighs from Simon’s clumsy hands have faded. She wonders what all that hidden, soft skin smells like. She rests her hands on Wanda’s shins, letting them spread out to run up and down them gently.

“Go to sleep,” Natasha tells her, keeping her voice low and lulling. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Wanda smiles, letting her eyes fall closed. Natasha snags the corner of the blanket from her own bed catty-corner to Wanda’s and drapes it over her, making sure her feet are covered up. She keeps her own hands safe and over the covers, letting her head fall back against the window as they chug along the highway, on their way to Philadelphia.

“Be careful, Nat,” comes Sif’s quiet voice from the front of the bus. Natasha opens her eyes and looks up to meet Sif’s in the rearview mirror. There’s no humor on Sif’s tired face, but her words come out concerned instead of just rude.

Natasha looks away and doesn’t reply, just closes her eyes and starts running her hands lazily along Wanda’s legs again. 

There’s nothing she can say that wouldn’t be a lie.

 

It’s hot as balls in Philly, and so they check into a motel again so they don’t all die of heatstroke. Carol and Kamala disappear for the evening, and the mystery is only solved when Sharon tells them that Carol has finally taken Kamala out on a date.

Simon goes out for what he swears is a business dinner with an old colleague, and so the rest of them pile into one of the bedrooms and order five pizzas and watch the Jurassic Park marathon on TNT.

“I honestly thought touring with a punk band would be much more wild,” Wanda comments during a commercial break, licking tomato sauce off her finger in a way that almost has Natasha purring. “You guys are downright domestic.”

“There’s just… a time and a place, you know?” Natasha folds up her crust and dips it into a container of ranch. “Tomorrow night after the show, we’ll go get trashed--”

“--And a few of us will get laid,” Maria adds. Natasha smirks at her.

“--And the next morning we’ll be complete assholes with hangovers who go eat at Waffle House at dawn,” Sif finishes. She plucks a pepperoni from her pizza slice and slides it into her mouth.

Wanda absorbs this information where she’s sat cross-legged on the bed Nat and Darcy are sharing, slowly consuming a piece of mushroom and black olive pizza while they talk. Natasha keeps an eye on her, wants to make sure she eats more than a single slice. She’s seemed leaner lately, especially since the first time they met; Wanda’s soft thighs slimmer than they had been, her tummy flatter. Natasha misses the softness. Worries about her, maybe needlessly.

Shut up.

“So, let me ask you this,” Wanda finally says, licking the grease from her lips and wiping her fingers off on her napkin. “Do girls in bands get as much action as guys do? I mean, you always hear about groupies and all that. I just wondered…”

She trails off, pink spreading across her round cheeks. Natasha smiles and tips her beer back, draining the rest of it and making fucking sure that she doesn’t have to be the one stuck answering _that_ question.

“God yes,” Sif says almost immediately, helping herself to another slice of Hawaiian pizza. “There’s just something about musicians, man. Girls just flock. It’s awesome.”

“And if you’re a hot guitarist with a great ass…” Darcy looks pointedly at Natasha from over the top of her cinnamon bread. “You’ve always got wet fingers and a sore tongue.”

“Jesus, Darce,” Natasha mumbles, glancing at Wanda and reaching over Sif for another beer. “Don’t be so fuckin’ poetic about it.”

“You should be proud of it!” Darcy points her bread at her with her eyebrows raised over her glasses. “You’re fucking amazing in bed. Lotsa practice.”

“No more beer for Darcy,” is all Natasha says in response, climbing up from the bed and walking over to the open door leading to the balcony, fishing her cigarettes out of her back pocket. “Gonna suck a fag.”

She settles into the uncomfortable plastic chair and puts her boots up on the railing, lighting up and exhaling into the stifling night air. Philadelphia is awake down below, traffic and voices so loud that Natasha feels calm, at home, the noise so similar to their rowdy neighborhood in Brooklyn.

She wants to call back home and check up, but she doesn’t want them to tease her about being a den mother or any shit like that. She sends Bucky a text of a blue heart emoji that he replies to almost immediately with a sparkly pink heart and a kissy face. It’s enough. It makes her smile.

“Mind having company?” Sif’s lovely, even voice breaks her from her thoughts. Natasha glances up with a smile before she nods over at the chair next to her.

“Not yours,” she replies.

She passes Sif the pack and gives her a second to light up and take a drag.

“Sharon knows a guy here in town who’s gonna come to the show tomorrow night,” Sif tells her as she pulls her long legs up into the seat. “He’s gonna score us some weed, at the very least. She said there might be some pills, too.”

“Sweet,” Nat mumbles, flicking her cigarette over the side of the railing. She’s half-listening to the conversation inside the room; Darcy complaining about dead ends and Wanda offering to trim her hair and Sharon leaving the room in search of scissors. Wanda’s got such a great voice. Like honey that’s just warm enough to drip, slow, slow, slow.

“--even listening to me?”

Natasha blinks.

“Huh?”

Sif’s quiet, and when Natasha looks over at her, she’s smiling, small and knowing.

“This is so bad, Nat.”

Natasha doesn’t even bother playing dumb. She sighs, tipping her head back to the dull shine of stars in the city sky and closes her eyes to them.

“I know.”

“She’s dating someone.”

“I _know,_ Sif.”

“Our _tour manager_.”

Natasha groans, rubbing hard at her face and shoving her hand into her hair to mess it up in annoyance.

“I didn’t fuckin’ _mean to_. Jesus. I don’t just do this shit and you know it.”

“You go for straight girls all the time.”

“I mean!” She lowers her voice, realizing how loud she’s being. “I mean go after chicks that are taken. Especially in shitty situations like this.”

Sif makes a noise that sounds like grudging agreement.

“So… you really like her.” It’s not a question. Natasha tenses up defensively before she sighs again, letting her head tip to one side to look over at Sif. Their eyes meet, and Sif’s smile is sympathetic.

“I didn’t mean to,” Natasha says softly.

“She is beautiful.” Sif sounds wistful as she takes a short drag, the cigarette caught between her middle and ring fingers like Natasha’s only seen Europeans do. It’s always hot as hell. 

“There are lots of hot girls out there. It’s not… just that.” Natasha glances back into the room just in time to see Darcy settle on the floor in front of Wanda who is armed with scissors and a focused expression. “She’s just kind of amazing.”

“Just be careful, yeah?” Sif takes a final pull before she stubs the cigarette out, standing up again and leaning down to press a gentle kiss to Natasha’s lips. Natasha smiles at her, careful not to nod, and watches her disappear back into the room.

She chainsmokes two more cigarettes and drains the rest of her beer, trying very hard not to let her thinking drift into brooding.

She dozes off at some point, because she wakes up to a soft _hey_ from behind her. Her eyes fly open but she doesn’t startle, just drops her boots to the concrete floor and reaches for another cigarette.

Wanda.

“Hey,” she mumbles around her fourth cigarette in an hour, glancing up to watch the liquid grace Wanda has as she arranges her lovely body into the empty chair. “Assistant, college student, sewer, nurse, and hair stylist? Is there anything you can’t do?”

Wanda smirks at her in the low flood of light from the room, her hands going up into her hair to gather it up in the most unbelievably tantalizing way. Natasha watches, unabashed and unblinking while Wanda gathers hair from her nape and wraps a hair tie around it all, the ponytail loose and lazy. Christ. _Girls._

“I can’t play guitar,” Wanda replies, an almost childishly hopeful expression taking over her face. Natasha exhales out of the corner of her mouth to keep the smoke from Wanda, raising an eyebrow when Wanda just watches her expectantly.

“...You want me to teach you to play guitar?”

Wanda’s face lights up. She nods so eagerly that Natasha nearly laughs.

“I’m left-handed,” she warns her, standing up to go fetch her guitar and passing the cigarette off to Wanda. 

“I know, I am too! That’s why I wanted you to show me.” She sits up straight now, like she’s trying to look competent and worthy of being taught. She looks like such a good, obedient little girl that Natasha nearly moans.

Like Wanda has to _talk_ her into anyfuckingthing.

“Alright, alright,” she sighs in false acquiesce, reaching into the room and grabbing her acoustic Taylor just inside the door. She hands it to Wanda and tugs her chair closer to her while Wanda drapes the strap over her body and scoots to the edge of her seat. She stubs the cigarette out after taking a single drag, her pink mouth pursed to exhale in a small plume of smoke.

Natasha is struck stupid for a minute, her eyes on Wanda in her tight white tanktop, very visible purple bra, and tiny denim skirt. And bare feet. Those goddamn, adorable bare feet. Her toenails are sky blue. That girl holding Natasha’s guitar, her fingers on the fret, unpracticed but eager. It’s like she’s got Natasha’s cock against her lips.

“Okay,” she says, her voice scratchy with lust. She tugs an ever-present pick out of her pocket and passes it over to Wanda who has her head tipped, staring down at the guitar, quiet and serious now.

“You’ve got great posture,” Natasha starts, standing up and dragging the chair behind Wanda so she can look over her shoulder at her fingers. “Now, make sure you’re relaxed. Don’t forget to breathe. You do yoga?”

Wanda nods her response, and Natasha’s glad she’s behind her because Wanda misses the pleased smile on her face.

“Good. Guitar has the same sort of concentration: focused but not overly so, your body relaxed but poised, deliberate movements, remembering to breathe, all that. You ready?”

Another nod. Natasha is closer behind her now, can smell the slight sweat on the back of her neck from the warm night, can smell the garlic and tomato and beer and her own cigarette on Wanda’s breath, can smell her shampoo because Wanda had just been playing with her hair. She takes her own advice and breathes her in, slow and careful.

“Alright, we’re gonna play a G minor first. Best chord to start with ‘cause a lot of songs use it. Okay, so you want your middle and ring fingers on the second and third strings just above the second fret.”

Wanda sits still for a second before tipping her head to the side, looking behind her at Natasha.

“Huh?”

Natasha grins at her.

“Here, I’ll show you.” Just like a fucking movie, Natasha presses against her, the low back of the chair not obstructing her upper body from resting on Wanda’s back. She slides her hands down Wanda’s bare arms and brings them to rest over top of her hands. “Relax your hands. Let me place your fingers.”

She starts to when Wanda obeys, placing them carefully on the strings at the right angle and pressing very gently to tell her to keep them just there.

“Good,” she murmurs. “Okay, strum.”

Wanda does. It comes out a little shaky, the sound unsure and slow but clean, no distortion from her finger placement.

“Distributing the pressure of your fingers is important. Your ring finger is the weakest finger, so it’s the hardest to get even with the others. Focus on that and strum again.”

Another strum, clearer and more confident. Natasha smiles, brings her hands to rest on the chair on either side of Wanda’s thighs.

“Good girl,” she tells her quietly. “Keep going. Until it feels good.”

After Wanda strums a few more times, Natasha lifts her left hand again and moves Wanda’s fingers, pleased at how easily pliant she is, how she lets Natasha move her without hesitation. 

“Okay, that’s the C chord. Now, when you strum, don’t go all the way to the bottom string. Leave it out. Got it?”

Wanda strums instead of nodding, grinning at the change in sound. She does it a few more times, and Natasha leaves her hand on Wanda’s thigh instead of moving it back to the chair.

“Now, switch between the two chords, one after the other after the other. Can you do that? Do you remember?”

“I remember,” Wanda whispers, almost to herself, her eyebrows drawn in concentration, her eyes on her left hand on the fretboard. The transition between chords is uneven at first, but she gets it pretty quickly, not ever moving too fast but keeping it well-paced, rhythmic. Natasha grins as she rests her chin on Wanda’s shoulder.

“Of course you’re a natural,” she says, her voice warm with praise. She can see Wanda’s smile out of the corner of her eye as she returns her hands to Wanda’s thighs, letting them rest there as innocently as she can, her fingertips on bare skin because her skirt is just that fucking short.

“Maybe you’re just an amazing teacher.” Wanda keeps going but it’s slowed again, and Natasha is suddenly aware that Wanda is paying more attention to her than she is playing. She indulges herself, ribs digging hard against the back of the chair as she presses her breasts even more snug to Wanda’s back.

She can feel Wanda breathing, the soft inhale and exhale that deepens when Natasha lets her fingertips press into the soft skin of the tops of Wanda’s thighs.

“Where’s your red today? Hmm? I’ve been looking all evening and I haven’t spotted it yet.” And maybe she’s turned her head a little, let her lips drag just barely against Wanda’s neck as she says it.

A deeper breath from Wanda, her hands pausing completely on the guitar.

“Where do you think?” she murmurs, her thighs spreading the tiniest bit under Natasha’s hands. Natasha closes her eyes and breathes her in deep, her nose pressed right to Wanda’s pulsepoint as she lets her fingers slide toward the inside of Wanda’s thighs, her bandaged knuckles pressing against the bare ones opposite before she starts to pry those beautiful legs apart, so slow, savoring.

She drags her nails up and down all that hidden skin of Wanda’s inner thighs, fingers disappearing into the heat under her skirt before moving back down again.

Wanda swallows, the dry click of it loud because it’s so close to Natasha’s ear. Wanda arches then, spreading her thighs as much as her skirt will allow and tipping her hips forward so that Natasha’s fingers fall dangerously close to the damp heat of her cunt under the skirt.

There’s a sudden, loud knock at the door back inside the room, and it startles them apart immediately. Natasha shoots back from Wanda like she’s been shot from a gun, the sound of her chair scraping across the concrete floor embarrassingly loud.

She glances up at Wanda whose face is flushed, her chest heaving, eyes glued to the door in the room where Sif is opening the door and Simon walks in like he owns the place, sweaty bright-eyed and grinning.

He’s pretty fucking high.

“There she is,” he all but purrs when he makes his way through the room and right out onto the balcony where Natasha is now standing in the corner, beer in her hand, trying to look casual and probably failing miserably. “Hey, I’m back. I need you back in the room.”

Wanda looks up at him almost in surprise, her hands on the guitar again--finger placement perfect--as she blinks at Simon.

“What?”

“Come baaack. I need you.” He’s probably trying to sound cute and playful but it turns Natasha’s stomach, makes her grip the railing hard, her teeth grinding together. But she can’t look away, just can’t fucking do it.

Simon lifts the guitar from Wanda’s body and props it against the railing, reaching down to run his hands crudely over Wanda’s tits through her shirt, gripping them hard like they’re on a fucking doll instead of a woman. She shies away from the touch, trying to stand up, but he just continues lower, dragging her skirt up and pushing her thighs apart to rub his hand right over her pussy through her panties.

Her cherry red panties with a dark wet spot right in the middle.

“So fuckin’ wet already, love. You need it, don’t you?” Simon husks against her ear. Wanda’s eyes find Natasha’s while Simon rubs her soft little cunt through soaked cotton, her lashes fluttering as she moves helplessly into the touch. Natasha takes a deep breath and looks away, clearing her throat loudly and reaching down to grab her guitar.

“Sorry. This is a no-breeder-sex zone. You’re gonna have to take that elsewhere.” She snags her beer and steps back inside just as Wanda stands up, pushing Simon’s hands away and tugging her skirt down, whispering angrily to Simon about professionalism and respecting other people’s space. 

Everyone else in the room is quiet like a group of people who know what the fuck’s up but are pretending very hard that they don’t. They’re all actually _watching Lost World_ now, picking at the last few pieces of pizza and staying quiet enough to hear everything. 

Natasha throws her guitar in the corner, ignoring the vibrant clang of it landing and falls onto her bed next to Darcy. Darcy wraps a sympathetic arm around her, letting her nails run over Natasha’s arm while Simon and Wanda make their way quickly through the room and to the door.

“See you all tomorrow at noon for soundcheck. Have a good night!” Simon sounds so self-satisfied that Natasha wants to punch him. She glances up and meets Wanda’s eyes for a single second, the moment so quick that it’s impossible to figure out all of the things Wanda was trying to communicate with the look

“Night,” they all chorus back in unison. Natasha looks away from her just before they leave the room. She holds in her sigh but it leaves her tense, something Darcy seems to feel because she leans down and kisses Natasha on the cheek.

“Sorry, babe,” she says softly.

Natasha shrugs, pulling on indifference like an old sweater. She tucks down tighter against Darcy’s chest and lets herself be petted, not reacting at all when she starts hearing Simon fucking Wanda in the next room, just on the other side of the wall; the squeak of the tired old bed, the headboard thumping lazily against the wall, the low murmur of Simon talking, and Wanda’s almost reluctant-sounding whimpers.

Sharon turns up the TV.


	4. gold dust woman

Sometimes, it happens just like in the movies.

Natasha will be up onstage, sweat dripping down her chest and disappearing into her ratty tanktop, her guitar gripped in her hand like a weapon as she plays fury and hunger from her fingertips, out through the speakers, and down into the ears of the lovely people in front of her. The first three rows are nothing but women, nothing but a writhing mass of beautiful faces lost in the catharsis of a punk show, breasts pressed to the lip of the stage, arms up in their chaotic dance, fingertips so close that Natasha could touch them, if she had a spare five seconds during a song.

She doesn’t.

Sometimes, there’s that one girl. Natasha gets a spidey sense about it. They’ll make eye contact during a particular filthy lyric (tonight’s was _you were born to be on your knees for me, weren’t ya?_ ), and even in the bright lights of the stage and during all the craziness, Natasha will be caught, ensnared. Will play to that girl for the rest of the show, every word, every snarling curl of music meant for her.

This girl looks Dominican, her hair long and wild, skin dark and flawless and smooth, her shirt one she’d fashioned herself with laces running up the sides of her curvy waist. Her tits are glorious and glistening with sweat, her dark eyes rimmed in heavy black, her pink mouth bare and smirking at Natasha.

Sometimes, it’s just inevitable.

 

In under an hour, she has her hands in all that hair as she drags Adriana’s mouth back and forth roughly over her own clit, chasing an orgasm as she pictures Wanda behind her closed eyelids.

Wanda who had avoided her all day, who had kept close to Simon and had been absent during soundcheck and their early dinner afterwards. Simon had given some excuse about buying books for a summer class that starts soon, about a FaceTime date with Pietro, but Natasha sees it for what it is, sees it and says the bare minimum for the rest of the day to anyone.

Wanda’d come to the show tonight, had sat way back at the bar with Simon and Maria, had refused to make eye contact with Natasha at any moment during the show.

And so, Natasha had found Adriana.

“Shit, shit, shit, _yes_ ,” she growls as she grinds down on that fierce little mouth, her cunt clenching hard before it floods with come, dripping down Adriana’s chin and her throat. She rides that tongue for a few more gloriously hazy minutes, not caring about the women who are coming and going from the bathroom, ignorant to the voices and the opening and closing of the door. 

Fuck all of them.

 

She saunters out of the bathroom and back into the bar half an hour later, her tongue aching but she’s got the smirk of a dyke who just made a girl come three times and whose mouth tastes like pussy.

She walks up to the bar like she owns the place, lifting her head in greeting to the bartender as she pulls out her wallet.

“Heineken.”

“Ahh, the delicate but refined taste of pussy and Heineken,” comes Darcy’s voice beside her just as she takes her first drink. “Your favorite.”

“My favorite,” Natasha agrees, licking her lips and turning to the beautiful girl beside her who knows her so well, maybe too well. It’s nights like these that Natasha loathes Jane Foster and happy, monogamous relationships. “Where is everybody?”

“Oh, you know. Around. But Wanda Maximoff is in the back.” Darcy takes her own Corona from the bartender and valiantly ignores Natasha’s disgusted expression while she laces their fingers together and tugs her away from the bar. “That’s actually why I came to find you.”

“Because you like to see me tortured? Or helplessly expressing emotion? Rude, Darce.” She follows along behind her ex-girlfriend, savoring the view of her ass in her high-waisted shorts and not really paying attention to much else.

“We were back there chilling, you know. There’s a guy Sharon knows who brought party favors. So we’re all hanging out, doing whatever, and Wanda comes in and she looks upset.” Darcy stops her outside of the closed door where the back room is, reserved for bands and whoever they decide is worthy of joining them. Natasha feels a little curl of worry start in her belly, beer bottle gripped in her hand.

“Upset? Why was she upset? Is Pietro okay?”

Darcy frowns.

“Who’s Pietro? No, no, she…” Darcy licks her lips, pausing like she’s debating on what she should say.

“ _Darcy_ , just fuckin’ tell me.”

“I guess she saw you,” Darcy rushes out, her eyes down on her own bottle, pushing the lime down into her beer. “In the bathroom. Or heard you. I don’t know. I just… I just know. Because I’ve been there. I recognized that look on her face.”

Natasha just stares at her, trying to process it all, letting it absolutely crush her post-show-and-sex high because… well. She deserves it. There’s hurt on Darcy’s face, long-buried pain that the two of them had just ignored rather than deal with, and Natasha has to restrain herself from apologizing to Darcy again for being a shitty girlfriend. There are more immediate things to deal with.

“So… what? You want me to talk to her? What the fuck am I supposed to say?”

She gulps down more of her beer, wishing suddenly that she’d gotten whiskey, that she’d had some of whatever that guy had brought them. She doesn’t fucking deal with emotion, not other people’s. She has enough of her own shit to deal with, goddamnit.

“No.” Darcy is hesitant again, but this time like she’s guilty. She sighs. “Wanda took some pills from that Kevin guy. And I guess she’s never really done drugs because she’s out of her mind in there. And Simon is… I don’t know. He doesn’t seem to fucking care. So I thought I’d come find somebody who _did_ care.”

“Jesus Christ.” She thinks back to what Wanda told her about her mom, about how she was a user, about how she died from an overdose. And now Wanda is here in this horrible environment that will let her fall right down that same rabbit hole. She hands Darcy her beer and runs her hands through her hair, trying to steel herself. “Okay. Alright. C’mon.”

They open the door to a room even hazier than the one they’d left, the music back here different, large bunches of people that Natasha has never met lounging around on couches and in chairs. There’s a table in the middle covered in half-eaten plates of food and empty glasses, and Simon is there with Sharon and some guy with long, stringy hair who is doing a line of coke off the table.

“Nat!” Sharon wiggles her fingers at her, grinning the grin of the medicated. “Guess what I just found out? Guess what?” She grabs Natasha’s wrist and pulls her closer, trying to whisper but failing miserably. “Simon and Tony used to date.”

“Sharon, for fuck’s sake!” Simon doesn’t seem too upset, is smug about it actually, and he smirks up at Natasha with red-rimmed eyes. “It was a long time ago. Back in school. He has one glorious cock, did you know that?”

“I know plenty about all the assholes I live with, thanks,” she replies, her entire body tense, her hands in fists at her sides. “Where’s Wanda?”

“Oh, she’s around. Been an absolute cunt all day, if you want to know the truth. I’m about to send her back home without her supper.” The other guy, Kevin, Natasha guesses, giggles at that so hard he snorts before he passes Simon the straw for the line he’d just prepared for him.

Darcy kicks Simon in the shin with her steel-toed Doc, drawing a pained cry from him and making him drop the straw, messing up the line of coke.

“Bloody fuck, what was that for?!”

“You don’t call women cunts, you pig. Especially not one that has to deal with _you_.” Darcy goes in for another kick that Simon dodges, and Sharon stands up to help Natasha pull her away.

“She’s over here, Nat,” Sharon tells her quietly, the three of them making their way across the room to the couches lining the back wall “She hasn’t wanted any of us around her.”

Natasha walks faster when she hears Wanda’s laugh, ending up in the darkest corner of the room just in time to see a guy with beefy arms covered in hair and tats pull Wanda’s thin, grey t-shirt from over her head.

“Hey!” She rushes over, startling quite a few people around them, and she shoves the guy back who gets his hands on Wanda’s breasts in her bra just as Wanda reaches behind her to unhook it. “No. Hey, no, stop.”

Sharon and Darcy drag the guy from the couch together and Natasha drops down to her knees beside Wanda, getting her hand on Wanda’s bra just as Wanda lets go. Natasha holds the ends together at Wanda’s back, preventing her bra from just falling off and exposing her tits to the room.

“Go away,” Wanda tells her very clearly even though her hands are uncoordinated as she tries to push Natasha away. Natasha ignores her, rehooking her bra with one hand because she’s talented like that and looking around for where the guy threw Wanda’s shirt. 

“Not a chance, doll,” Natasha says, snagging the shirt from the back of the couch and pulling it down over Wanda’s head only for Wanda to pull it off again.

“At least he wanted to see them.” Wanda looks right at her, staring straight into her eyes. Her pupils are huge, making her look so vulnerable and so beautiful, a smile tugging on her mouth even though there seem to be tears glistening in her eyes. Some kind of methamphetamine, Natasha guesses. “They’re pretty, Nat. He wanted to see them. Why don’t you want to see them?”

Natasha’s mouth purses in an attempt to just not fucking reply to that, and she stays quiet as she pulls Wanda’s shirt over her head, not letting go this time. She helps her arms through the sleeves and looks around for Wanda’s purse before she spies it tucked beside the couch.

“Pretty hilarious how suddenly this is all my fault,” Natasha mumbles to herself as she stands up, pulling Wanda with her. 

“I heard you,” Wanda tells her suddenly, wrapping her arm around Natasha’s neck while Nat wraps hers around Wanda’s waist, her purse on her shoulder. “In the bathroom, with that girl. I heard you. She was making you come.”

“Wanda, we really don’t have to talk about this right now.”

“It hurt. You know? It hurt. Because it kind of felt like you’re mine. Or like I’m yours. Or both. It’s supposed to be both, isn’t it?” Wanda rests her cheek on Natasha’s shoulder, and Natasha takes a deep breath, wishing Steve were here, or that they were home, that she could feel safe instead of like she’s drowning.

She forces down what very clearly wants to be a panic attack and walks them toward the front of the room.

“You belong to yourself,” Natasha tells her as evenly as she can. “And you’re dating Simon.”

“He doesn’t care about me,” Wanda says darkly, snuggling in closer to Natasha. “He doesn’t care. Not really. Not like you care.”

“Simon,” Natasha practically barks when they finally make it up to where he’s lounging now with a new gaggle of people. “What did she take?”

Simon grins up at her, looking so beatific and oblivious that Natasha very nearly punches him.

“Oh, I don’t know. Whatever’s…” he motions at the table, at the baggies of pills and powder and whatever else Kevin brought. “Shit, she’s just having a good time. You need to stop being so bloody serious, Natasha. It’s not a big deal.”

She wants to scream at him but it’s not who she is. Not what she does. She lets the fury keep her on her feet and help her walk Wanda out of the room, Darcy and Sharon close at her heels.

“Sorry, Nat,” Sharon says immediately, high on something herself but she’s sober for the moment, her eyes big and serious. “Everything just kind of happened so fast. I hope she’s okay.”

“She’ll be fine, Sharon. You didn’t do anything wrong. I’m gonna take her outside, okay? The air will probably do her some good. Then we’ll go to the bus. Just… have fun, alright? Don’t worry about it.” She gives Sharon as big of a smile as she can manage and nudges her back into the room.

“Text me if you need anything,” Darcy says quietly. “Sorry I kicked Simon.”

Natasha smiles, reaching up to tug on one of Darcy’s curls.

“Go kick him again from me.”

“Ohh, can I kick him!?” Wanda’s eyes light up, and it makes Darcy laugh on her way back into the room, pulling the door closed behind her.

“Not right now. C’mon, let’s get some air.” They weave through the crowd, a new band onstage now that has everyone dancing. It makes Natasha feel old somehow, like she belongs at home with her schedule and her chores and the people she knows and loves around her.

It’s a little cooler out tonight than it was last night, and Natasha leans against the side of the building while Wanda paces back and forth on the sidewalk, her stomach bare in her little crop top, her jeans just as high as Darcy’s, hiding her navel but showing off her curves gorgeously. 

Natasha pulls out a cigarette and lights it, exhaling on a sigh.

“How are you feeling?”

“Why did you fuck her? That girl?” Wanda stops her pacing and turns to look at Natasha who is all but slouched against the wall of the club, cigarette dangling from her lips. Wanda looks so hurt, so very _present_ that Natasha can’t bring herself to lie, to hide from it. Maybe Wanda will forget everything by morning anyway.

“Because I had a shitty day and I needed some relief. And she provided it.” She plucks the cigarette from her lips and watches Wanda process that, both of them ignoring the people hanging out around them, in various states of sobriety and doing things that would draw the attention of anyone else. 

“Why did you have a shitty day?” Wanda starts moving again, walking on the tips of her toes in her red boots, scuffing along the sidewalk in an irregular, strange dance.

“Just felt kind of ignored all day,” Natasha says, fighting with every word, hating how juvenile it sounds. She curls in on herself, wishing she’d brought her jacket from the bus. She feels too exposed to be having this conversation right now. “Like there was a lot of unresolved shit that only bothered me. That wasn’t worth dealing with apparently.”

“I want a cat,” Wanda replies out of absolutely nowhere, stopping again and smiling at Natasha. “Don’t you want a cat?”

Natasha blinks at her.

“What, you mean like… right now?”

“When we get home. I want a cat. A grey one. Or orange. Or whatever, it doesn’t matter. I want to go to the shelter and find a cat that speaks to me. That looks into my soul. You know? Don’t you want a cat?” She’s walking on the edge of the sidewalk, one foot in front of the other so carefully, her arms out for balance. Natasha aches for every single curve, every single inch of her.

“Um. Sure. Cats are great, I guess.” Natasha sinks down into a crouch, looking around them in a quick glance to make sure no one is watching Wanda too intently. She carries a knife in her back pocket, and she knows exactly how to use it.

“Bucky told me about the cat you two used to have. The black one with the orange on its nose.” 

Natasha is suddenly in a nightmare, dropped down into a place she never wanted to be again. She can picture the little cat so clearly, the one Bucky had named Donatello, the one they’d found outside near their house and fed in secret; scraps from the table and food that Mrs. Rogers bought for them to give to it. 

“Steve was allergic, they couldn’t take it home,” Wanda continues, unaware of the pain she’s dragging up in Natasha. Nat drops the cigarette and stands up again, ignoring the quick shudders of her own breath and the tears burning at the back of her eyes.

“Stop it,” Natasha whispers, almost begging. “Don’t.”

“He told me that--”

“ _Stop._ ” Natasha shouts it though it feels exactly like a sob, her hands pushing hard into her hair. Wanda startles, looking over at her like a frightened deer, her mouth open the tiniest bit. Natasha swallows, forces herself to calm down, to breathe. “I can’t… I don’t want to talk about that. Just… please. Stop.”

She doesn’t want to hear her own pain fed back to her, doesn’t want to hear the ending to the story, the one where Brock, the oldest boy in the house, the sadistic one who’s probably in prison now, found Donatello. And then Bucky had found Donatello weeks later.

Natasha had been the one to bury his little body.

“You were the strong one,” Wanda whispers, like she’s realizing it. “Bucky was… the things that happened to him before he came to the house, they broke him. He was already broken when you met him. You had to be the strong one. You had to hold him together.”

“Steve held him together,” Natasha replies, her voice shaking. She pulls Wanda’s purse up onto her shoulder and folds her arms over her chest, avoiding Wanda’s eyes. “I just survived.”

There are people watching them now, a small group who is hanging out nearby, all of them quiet, listening. 

“Let’s go to the bus.” Natasha doesn’t wait for an agreement, just grabs Wanda’s wrist and tugs her away from the club toward the bus where it’s parked in a lot across the street. It’s stiflingly hot inside, so they walk around the whole bus opening windows to let the slight breeze in. 

Natasha drops down to her bed, grabbing her pillow and wrapping her arms around it. Wanda turns on some of the little lights on the built-in nightstands, making the whole bus glow warm inside. It’s exactly what Natasha needs, that feeling of safety, of home. She takes a full breath for the first time in hours, letting it out slowly. She feels calmer.

“I talked to Bucky today,” Wanda tells her. She’s up near the front of the bus, fiddling with the radio for a minute before music starts softly from the speakers. Fleetwood Mac. Natasha can’t help but smile. 

Of course she listens to Fleetwood Mac.

She walks back to where Natasha is sprawled out on her bed, dancing again but only absently, just something to do while her mind probably races with her high.

“He gave me his number before I left home,” Wanda continues, her head tipped up to stare at the ceiling. “Told me to call him if I needed to talk to somebody.”

“What did you two talk about?” Natasha can’t help but ask even though she’s not sure she wants to know.

“You, mostly. I just… I wanted to know about you.” Wanda leans down to unlace her boots and toe them off along with her socks, leaving her barefoot and gliding gracefully down the aisle between the beds, her hair wild with the humidity of the bar and the summer night and her own body, tumbling in waves down her back and brushing her elbows.

“You could’ve just asked me,” Natasha says quietly, just barely over the music, her eyes all over Wanda’s body when she starts to move a little more pointedly, paying attention to the music.

“It’s easier to ask him. Not as scary. I don’t feel as… vulnerable asking him.” Wanda lifts her arms over her head, dragging some of her hair with her. Natasha shifts on her mattress.

“Why do you feel vulnerable asking me?”

“I feel vulnerable with everything when it comes to you.” Wanda stops moving to look down at Natasha in the low light just as another song starts up. It feels like a dream, like one of those moments that she already knows she’ll need to keep protected for the rest of her life.

“It’s mutual,” she says, her voice low. 

_Rhiannon rings like a bell through the night and wouldn’t you love to love her?_

“Just…” Wanda starts, her eyes glinting in the dark. “Just watch me, at least. Tonight, just watch me.”

Wanda’s hands go down to pull her shirt off again, her bra black and lacy with those balconette cups that make her spill out over the top like a bowl holding too much cream. She’s reaching back before Natasha can even process it and unhooking her bra, letting it fall away, leaving her breasts bare, her nipples high and tight like Natasha dreamt them up herself. 

“Fuck,” Natasha breathes, her eyes wide in the dark, unblinking. 

_All your life you’ve never seen a woman taken by the wind. Would you stay if she promised you heaven? Will you ever win?_

Her jeans go next, leaving her in panties so red they’re nearly black, tiny Brazilian-cut things that leave the entire, sweet curve of her stomach exposed. She starts to dance then, slow curves of movement that focus on her hips as she lifts her arms, eyes closed, face smooth and completely without shame as she moves.

Natasha flips the button on her own jeans and pushes a hand inside, sliding right over her cunt that is still slick because of Adriana, over the fat nub of her clit that is so here for this, that throbs under the attention of Natasha’s middle finger as she starts to rub it hard.

Wanda moves like a fantasy, almost too slow to be real, completely in tune with the song that was probably written about someone exactly like Wanda, just as beguiling and luscious and the embodiment of everything Natasha has ever craved.

Her breasts look softer than silk and are more than two handfuls, the skin paler than the moon and purpled faintly with bruises, just like the rest of her. She turns and lets Natasha watch her ass, moves it slow so Natasha can savor it, so she can watch every drag of her hips, so she can see just how plush it is.

Natasha can see everything; the tiny flowers on the lace waistband of her low-cut panties, the soft, secret pale hairs at the small of her back, the shadowed mound of her little cunt through the dark fabric, the goosebumps running all over her pale body from the breeze through the windows, the shivering, hard juts of her deep pink nipples. She takes it all in, keeps every detail greedily close, letting them all wash over her like warm water.

She comes silently, finger working furiously over her clit just as the song fades, her hips arching up into her hand. She pants into the dark as it spreads through her body like fire, her eyes refusing to close, to miss a single second of Wanda dancing for her.

Wanda kneels down in front of her, her eyes so bright in the gold light, staring right at her while Natasha rubs her cunt, easing it down from orgasm, pulling the last few shivers of it out.

“Feed it to me,” Wanda whispers, her eyes burning into Natasha’s.

Natasha presses her fingers in hard, gathering as much come as she can on them and pulling her hand free. She holds it up for Wanda, fingers soaked with slick, webbed together with glistening lines of it. Wanda takes hold of her wrist with both hands, steadying her hand as she opens her mouth to draw Natasha’s fingers inside, her tongue sliding between them while she sucks them clean.

Natasha swallows hard, her right hand absently sneaking into her jeans to rub again while Wanda licks her hand clean of come. Wanda pulls off of her fingers, exposing them to the cool air and licking at them now one at a time, her eyes closed like she’s not trying to be sexy, like this is just for her. 

Nat comes again just watching her, feeling that tongue on her skin and imagining it lapping at her pussy, drinking down every drop she can suck out. She shakes in absolute silence, her new Diesel boxer briefs completely ruined now, sticky with come that just will not stop gushing out of her.

“I’m going to go shower,” Wanda whispers against Natasha’s fingers. “Simon will be here soon.”

She presses a kiss to Natasha’s middle finger, glancing up into her eyes and giving her a secret smile before she stands up again. Natasha watches her gather her clothes again and disappear into the back of the bus where the tiny shower is.

Natasha stays just like she is for a long time, Fleetwood Mac playing on, everything faint, hazy around her. She finally stirs and strips her sweaty clothes off, tossing her ruined briefs over onto Wanda’s bed as a thank you before she collapses back on her own. 

Stevie Nicks sings to her tenderly about the landslide while she stares at the ceiling and daydreams, smoking a couple of cigarettes in a boneless quiet that is shattered when the bus door opens without warning.

She yanks the covers up over her body, hiding her nakedness as everyone piles onto the bus. Most everyone is either high or drunk or both, oblivious to Natasha and her altered world.

Wanda emerges in the middle of it, wearing her tiny grey top and those black-red panties again, her wet hair turning the shirt a dark grey down the line of her back. Natasha watches her settle into her own bed, watches those eyes widen when she spies Natasha’s underwear on her pillow.

She looks up at Natasha, blinking at her in surprise as she tucks the briefs under her pillow. She licks her lips, lowering her gaze with an intimate smile that makes Natasha grin. 

Carol passes around Jack and Cokes that she’s mixing at the table at the front of the bus, and Sif changes the music to Black Flag and locks the door on the bus so the party is now a self-contained one.


	5. like a lonely lover's charm

“I did not sign up for this.”

“Oh, Simon,” Kamala sighs, reaching up to grip his shoulder with a bright smile. “It’ll be fun! Like when you were little and you’d pretend you were driving a big, big truck!”

“I never did that. I liked to build cities out of Legos and have He-Man destroy them.” He’s actually sulking, but he takes the keys when Kamala drops them in his palm. She beams at him.

“Thank youuu!”

“I knew this would happen. Being the only bloke. I knew it. They’d gang up on me and take advantage of me. I fuckin’ knew it,” he mumbles to himself as he trudges to the front of the bus and sinks down defeatedly into the driver’s seat.

Carol grins at Kamala, lifting her fist to bump it against Kamala’s and leaning down to kiss her on the forehead.

“Thanks, babe,” Carol says, wrapping her arm around Kamala’s shoulders and tugging her toward the back of the bus where her bunk is. “We can watch whatever you want. No limits.”

“ _Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure_!” Kamala fist pumps, and Carol valiantly holds in a sigh.

Natasha watches them with a pleased smile, her acoustic guitar resting across her lap where she’s lounging in her bed. She’s been playing lazily for better part of an hour while they wait in traffic that hasn’t moved in an hour and a half. They’d decided to drive over to Ocean City on the way down to Baltimore, and a five-car accident had stopped them outside Wilmington.

Simon has taken over as driver from Carol who hasn’t slept in over twenty-four hours, who will endure Pee-Wee Herman just so she can snuggle with her new, tiny maybe-girlfriend.

Maria and Sharon are sitting cross-legged at the little table just behind the driver’s seat, engaged in what appears to be a very intense game of Rummy.

Darcy is snoring in the bed right beside Natasha’s, a Holly Golightly sleep mask over her eyes, one arm flung out into the aisle that everyone has been careful to step over.

Sif is folded up like a beautiful gazelle in her bed, sketchbook on her lap, headphones in her ears, pencil flying across the page. She’s been looking up and across the aisle at Wanda as she draws. Natasha knows she’s going to be begging for that sketch.

Natasha has been watching Wanda, too, has kept her eyes on her since dawn broke and Wanda had woken up, eaten some trail mix, and started writing in her ever-present notebook.

She’s meditating now. She’s sitting up in her bed, headphones on, eyes closed, taking slow, deep breaths that have Natasha nearly hypnotized. She’s been doing it for the better part of an hour, even through the Maria and Kamala french fry battle that ended with ketchup on the windows and Simon handing them paper towels and Windex.

Natasha pulls herself out of her thoughts only to find that Wanda’s eyes are now open and locked to her own.

She blinks. Wanda grins at her.

Natasha stands up and brings her guitar with her, crossing the tiny aisle in her sweatpants and one of Steve’s scrub tops, looking about as ratty and unshowered as she ever does. And Wanda is still looking at her like that. Amazing.

“Is this seat taken?” She glances down at the empty spot next to Wanda on her bed. Wanda smiles up at her through her lashes, sliding her headphones down around her neck as she shakes her head.

Natasha sits down carefully, not wanting to jostle Wanda too much. She strums on her guitar, turning to look at Wanda in playful flirtation, one side of her mouth tugged up into a smile.

“Any requests, little lady?”

Wanda smiles, tucking her hair behind her ear almost shyly, her gaze fixed on Natasha’s guitar instead of her face.

“You pick,” she says finally, shifting on the mattress until their knees are touching. She takes her headphones off completely and relaxes in against Natasha’s side. Natasha strums thoughtfully, digging through the endless catalogue of songs in her head before she lands on the perfect one.

She grins and places her fingers on the fret, starting in on the opening melody.

“This should be played on an electric, but you get the point,” she says over the notes, glancing up into Wanda’s bright green eyes.

“Mmm, you’re so pretty,” she sings quietly, her voice a little too low, too scratchy, but she adjusts the pace of the song to her growl. “Not to talk to you would be a crime.”

Wanda blushes just like Natasha knew she would, dimples peeking out as she smiles, ducking her face so that her hair will hide it but Natasha sees it anyway.

“Ah, let me put my arms around you. Just wanna use up a little of your time.” She nudges Wanda with her shoulder before she starts in on the chorus. “Baby, baaaby, baby. Baby, baaaby, baby. Baby, baaaby, baby. Won’t you be my girl?”

Wanda can’t seem to hold in her grin now. She tucks in closer to Natasha, resting her temple gently on her shoulder, moving with her while Natasha sways a little with the rest of the song. She ends with with a flourishing series of fast strums, maybe a little too pleased with herself because she can’t stop fucking smiling.

“What song was that?” Wanda asks as Natasha tugs the guitar from her body and props it against the nightstand separating Wanda’s bed from Maria’s. 

“Well, surprisingly, it’s called ‘Baby Baby.’ And‘s by The Vibrators.” She drapes her arm over Wanda’s shoulders just like the song said, letting the tips of her fingers drag up the line of her shoulder and up her neck to her ear. She savors the shiver that runs through Wanda’s body as she makes that same trail again and again. Simon isn’t far away, is sat behind the wheel texting on his phone while they’re still stuck in traffic, the air on full blast to try and combat the brutal heat from the morning sun. Natasha looks up every few seconds, just sure that he’s going to look back and catch them any second now. “How’d you sleep?”

Wanda shrugs, letting her arm lay across Natasha’s lap so she can reach her free hand. Natasha turns it over, letting her fingers relax, watching as Wanda gently runs her nails along her palm and up the lengths of her fingers.

“Okay, I guess,” Wanda replies. “A little restless.”

“It’s the pills. It might take a couple of days for them to leave your system. You probably aren’t hungry either, are you?”

Wanda lines her hand up with Natasha’s, their lifelines mirrored, heartlines pressing together. She shakes her head.

“I want you to eat,” Natasha says quietly. “When we get to Ocean City, you need to eat. Okay?”

“Okay,” Wanda agrees, soft and just for her. Her nails return to Natasha’s palm again, dragging in slow circles as Natasha strokes over the shell of Wanda’s ear, the curve of her jaw, her soft, round cheek. Wanda sighs after a long moment, a pleased little sound. She nuzzles into Natasha’s neck, dragging her nose along the side of Natasha’s throat. “Hey, can you do me a favor?”

“Anything,” Natasha replies, her cheek resting against the sun-warmed top of Wanda’s head.

“Pietro is about to call me. He’s getting a little break, and he just wants to FaceTime real quick. Would you mind saying hi? I’ve… he wants to meet you.” Wanda’s fingers slide between Natasha’s. They’re holding hands now. Natasha’s heart leaps like she’s eleven years old again and she holding hands with Pepper Potts for the first time.

“You been talkin’ about me?” The words are so low, meant for a much more private moment than the one they’re being allowed. Wanda’s hand grips a little tighter at Natasha’s as she squirms closer. She only nods in reply, her cheek warming up against Natasha’s collarbone. 

“I’d love to meet him. I’m sure he’s amazing.”

“He _is_ amazing,” Wanda assures her, lifting up to grin over at Natasha excitedly. The phone rings just then, and Wanda digs it out of her blankets and unplugs her headphones to accept the call.

“ _Moa lan, djyeha!_ ” Wanda is beaming when a boy with bleach blonde hair and a matching grin comes into view on the little screen. Natasha crowds in closer so that Pietro can see her, even if it’s only in the corner of his phone.

“ _Moa lan!_ ” Pietro seems to notice Natasha for the first time, and his eyes light up even more. “Wow, hi. Are you Natasha?”

“Call me Nat,” she replies as Wanda holds the phone between them, letting Natasha and Pietro get a good look at each other. “Good to finally meet you, Pietro.”

“ _Dona tanpa, djyeha_ ,” Pietro says as he leans closer, apparently meaning the strange words for Wanda. Wanda’s cheeks turn an amazing shade of pink as she glares at her brother on the screen.

“Pietro,” she says warningly. “Be good. How’s everything going? Are you taking a break?”

“Yeah, a five minute one. I’ve been in the gym all morning. I twisted my ankle last week, so I’ve been trying to take it easy.” Pietro looks like he’s outside in the sun now, leaning back against a beige concrete wall. Natasha watches Wanda more than anything, the way her face relaxes, the way her tone changes, easy and careless and happy.

She wants her to be able to feel that relaxed around her one day.

They talk back and forth for a few minutes about their days, the conversation dotted with those strange words that Natasha has never heard before but she doesn’t ask about yet. She rests her cheek on Wanda’s shoulder, their hands still tangled together on Natasha’s thigh, and listens to Wanda feel at home.

“I’m sorry, Nat. We’re being so boring,” Pietro says after he explains the rest of his schedule for the day to Wanda. Natasha smiles at him, giving a lazy shrug.

“I don’t mind. I love seeing Wanda when she talks to you. She’s so happy.”

Another squeeze of her hand. Natasha squeezes back.

“ _Neda pa_ ,” Pietro says, staring straight at Wanda somehow, his tone very serious. Wanda only smiles, bringing the phone close so she can press a kiss to the screen.

“We’re gonna go, _djyeha_. I love you.”

“I love you back times five times five times five. Nice to meet you, Nat!”

Natasha waves at him with the hand hanging over Wanda’s shoulder. 

“You, too. Hope to meet you in person someday.”

Pietro gives her that same mysterious smile that Wanda does, like he knows something she doesn’t. Hell, maybe he does.

“Bye, you two.”

“Bye!” they singsong in unison.

Wanda hangs up and drops the phone back on the bed, sighing as she tucks back against Natasha.

“Miss him?” Natasha asks.

Wanda only nods, rearranging them so that she can wrap both of her arms around one of Natasha’s, pillowing her cheek on Natasha’s firm bicep.

“Was that twinspeak I just got to hear?” She glances down at Wanda as best as she can, pleased with her sheepish smile.

“Yeah, sorry. The doctors always said we’d grow out of it, but.” She shrugs, chewing on the inside of her lip while she thinks. “It’s comforting. You know? Just something that feels safe and familiar when nothing else does.”

Natasha nods, holding in her own story about the language she and Steve and Bucky used to have, the one created for survival, that Bucky sometimes still slips into on the bad days. She longs to say some of the words again suddenly, to have the familiarity of them in her mouth and in her own voice in her ear, even now when she’s hundreds of miles away from those two, her chosen brothers. She doesn’t say anything because she’s still not good at talking about it, about any of it.

Not even when she’s right beside someone she desperately wants to know and be known by.

“I understand,” she says softly, and leaves it at that.

 

The trip to Ocean City lasts only a few hours because of the traffic jam that held them up for the better part of the day. They grab a late lunch at a seafood joint right on the beach (Wanda has a salad and Natasha makes her eat three hush puppies and dessert) and they change on the bus into various states of swimwear. 

Natasha tugs on her black boy-cut boardshorts and a bikini top that makes her tits look very honestly out of this world. She shoves her feet into her trusty Vans and is almost off the bus when Sif appears again from outside. She stops just at the top of the steps, staring at Natasha with massive blue eyes.

Natasha refuses to shrink from the attention.

“What?”

“You’re…” Sif walks closer like she’s hypnotized, her eyes zeroed in on Natasha’s breasts. “You’re wearing a _bikini_.”

“I am not!” she defends, hiding her tits now under her arm, her cheeks flushing very, very (very) lightly. “I’m wearing boardshorts. Broshorts. Like a good fuckin’ butch.”

“And a bikini top.” Sif raises her eyebrows as a million-dollar grin takes over her face. “You usually wear a sports bra. And sometimes you bind. Don’t lie to me, Nat. I know you too well for that.”

“So what?” Natasha mumbles, lowering her arm and hugging her towel against her stomach. “Maybe I wanted to give them a breather.”

Sif’s smile softens.

“You look fucking amazing.”

Natasha definitely does blush then, and she can’t hide her smile as she rolls her eyes and pushes past Sif toward the steps. 

“I always look amazing. I’m just more jiggly today.”

She hops down into the sand and there’s Darcy in a scandalously tiny bikini, and she’s shaking her tits and her booty all over Carol.

“Wiggle it! Juuust a little bit!”

“Darcy, stop sexually harassing me. I’m gonna tell Simon!”

“And Simon will do nothing because he is a gazelle living amongst a pack of hyenas and he has a keen survival instinct,” Simon replies as he types on his phone through his signature Wayfarers. “Alright, lads. Are we all accounted for?”

Sif jumps down off the bus and pulls it closed behind her. She pulls her sunglasses on and saunters over as cat-like as she can in the sand.

“Ready.”

Natasha finally looks over at Wanda now that it’s safe, refusing to whimper at her cute little scarlet halter top and her truly miniscule Brazilian bottoms. Her sunglasses are red and heart-shaped, and she looks like every Lolita fantasy Natasha has ever had.

“Hey.” She slots in beside Wanda as they make their way toward the ocean in the hot, late afternoon sun, only now realizing that Wanda is just staring at her, her eyes hidden behind the dark lenses, but her mouth is open in shock. 

For once, Natasha doesn’t shy away from the ogling.

“What?” she asks innocently, raising her eyebrows and relishing every second Wanda can’t speak.

“You.” She finally looks away, glancing over to where Simon is talking on his phone with a promoter in Baltimore. Her voice drops to a quiet whisper. “You look so… wow.”

“What, these old things?” Natasha grins and bumps Wanda’s hip with her own. “I grew ‘em myself.”

“I just never… you always…” Wanda stops talking, maybe realizing she can’t form sentences. She smiles down at their sandy feet just as they near the water’s edge. Natasha watches her, wanting to grab her and kiss every fucking inch of her. “You’re gorgeous.”

“Mm,” Natasha says, reaching over and sliding a hand around the lowest part of Wanda’s back, fingers dipping in under the fabric as she presses her mouth to Wanda’s ear. “You look like you’d melt in my mouth, doll.”

She drops a secret kiss to Wanda’s jaw before tossing her towel back toward the sand and walking into the sea, diving in when it’s deep enough, letting it surround her and hold her, suspend her in time so she can hold on to this feeling.

 

They swim and rent boogie boards and curl up on towels like cats in the sun while the sun sinks lower and lower in the sky. They’re all out of the water when the sun touches the ocean on the horizon, and they fall into a sacred quiet while it sets, pushing innumerable colors into the once-blue sky. Simon has his arm around Wanda on the other side of the little crowd, and Natasha forces herself to be okay with it.

It’s fine. Of course it’s fine.

They rinse off in the showers on shore and pile back onto the bus with a few six-packs of Corona and a bag of limes. Simon drags Wanda to his bed in the back of the bus, and Natasha grabs a bottle of water from the fridge and sits down behind the wheel of the bus, turning on Fugazi and cranking up the volume.

She’d rather drive the three hours to Baltimore than listen to Simon slobber all over Wanda the whole time.

 

“Can we go out?” Maria is at the door of the band’s motel room pretty immediately after they get in and throw their bags down. “I think it’d be fun to go find a good dyke bar and just let loose tonight, you know?”

Darcy perks up from where she’s leaned over her suitcase.

“I just got that cute new dress in Philly. I’m game.”

“Where are we going?” Wanda appears beside Maria from down the hall where she’s rooming with Simon, wearing cut-offs with that damn swim top that is making Natasha want to grind against every flat surface she encounters, goddamnit.

“Out to find a lezzie bar.” Darcy takes off her shirt and pulls the dress on with no bra because she’s got the best rack in the world. “You wanna come?”

“Sure!” Wanda’s trying to sound casual and Natasha can tell. She glances over at Natasha and gives her a little smile before looking away again. “What should I wear?”

“Depends on how many women you want to torture.”

 _Just one_ , Natasha answers for her silently.

 

Port in the Storm is the only actual lesbian bar in Baltimore, and it’s packed on the balmy Friday night when they finally get there. Natasha had bound her tits snugly under her tight black tanktop, and her faded jeans cling to her unavoidable curves, the denim worn and destroyed all the way down to her black biker boots. It’s the black fedora she pulls on just before she leaves that makes the whole outfit, that turns lovely femme heads the second she walks in the door.

She just smirks and keeps her eyes straight ahead, following Wanda’s every move.

Wanda who is wearing a skintight black dress under a denim jacket with the sleeves cut off. Her hair is up in a crazy, complicated bun-ponytail thing that has always confounded Natasha and every dude she’s ever known, and her face is bare of makeup except her blood red lips.

“C’mon, let me buy you a drink,” Carol says suddenly from behind her. She sidles up and wraps her arm around Natasha’s shoulders and steers her toward the bar.

“But--”

“Nat,” Carol says, slow and patient, guiding her right up to the worn wooden bar between gaggles of lesbians. “You need to go after someone you can have. At least take a break tonight and stay in reality for a little while. Okay?”

Carol’s fierce blue eyes are rimmed heavily in black eyeliner, and her black D.A.R.E shirt has a rainbow font that is somehow glowing in the dark. She stares at Natasha until she finally gives in and nods.

“Great!” She grins at Natasha and leans forward to give their drink order to the bartender.

Natasha takes the moment of freedom to stand on the bottom rung of the bar stool next to her, lifting up above the crowd just a little and seeking out Wanda. She spots her with Darcy and Sif across the room, the three of them piling their purses and jackets on a table in the corner before they wade out onto the dance floor.

Carol nudges Natasha’s shoulder with a glass.

“Whiskey sour.”

Natasha takes the drink and lifts it in salute before taking a sip of it, her eyes trained helplessly on Wanda still.

“Nat,” Carol sighs, but it’s gentler this time. “Seriously. This is ridiculous.”

Natasha shakes her head, frowning down into her drink, words trapped in her throat instead of coming out to defend her. She swallows around the knot on her throat as the song blasting from the speakers changing to something loud and thumping. 

“You don’t get it,” she finally says, lifting the glass to her lips for another drink. “I’m… it’s nothing I can explain, C, I’m sorry. But you just don’t understand.”

“I understand that you’re going to get your heart broken. That’s all I care about.” Carol leans back against the bar, sipping on her Tom Collins and watching Natasha like she’s her fucking psychiatrist. 

“You should be proud of me that I even give a fuck about somebody.” It comes out meaner than she intends but she’s too hurt to take it back. She looks up to find Wanda surrounded by women, none of them Sif or Darcy. Her heart leaps into her throat as she stands up straight again, pushing up onto her toes and trying her damnedest to see over the crowd.

There are three girls dancing with Wanda, one of them pretty with curly blonde hair pressed against her from the front, a Japanese girl with electric blue hair laughing with Wanda and dancing at her side and a tall butch wearing a tie grinding right against Wanda’s ass. 

Natasha is so staggeringly, immediately jealous that her vision goes white. She downs the rest of her drink and doesn’t look away from the little cluster as she slams the glass down on the bar. 

“Nat,” Carol warns, pushing herself to stand up straight as she reaches for Natasha’s shoulder. “Don’t.”

Natasha shrugs her off and pushes into the throng, her attention not straying from her goal. It takes her a few minutes to make her way through the crowd, but she ends up right beside the adorable blue-haired girl, debating with herself about exactly how much dignity she feels like losing tonight.

She insinuates herself into the little group with a slide of her foot in among all the others, her stomach brushing Wanda’s hip. Wanda doesn’t react, doesn’t look up, but the butch girl does. She and Natasha make eye contact, the challenge between them silent but clear.

Natasha reaches between the blonde and Wanda and drapes an arm around Wanda’s hip, pressing in a little more snug against her side. Wanda’s eyes are closed, her arms raised, the sweet curves of her hips moving languidly to the beat. She doesn’t care who’s around, who is touching her; she’s lost in her own world in the middle of it all.

The song changes again, something slow and grinding bumping through the speakers, the beat dirty just as the lights drop a little lower. The blonde and the blue girl divide off and start to dance with each other, leaving Natasha and the other butch girl pressed to Wanda. Natasha slides right up against her front, her bound breasts tight against the softness of Wanda’s under her thin dress.

She watches Wanda, the way her lashes flutter on her cheeks, the way her red mouth curves into a blissful smile as she dances, caught between two warm bodies.

“Love the way you move, little girl,” comes the low voice of the other girl, her lips moving down Wanda’s bare neck as she grips Wanda’s hips and drags her back deeper against her crotch. Wanda just smiles bigger, not saying a word in reply, not opening her eyes, just letting her hips move under those firm hands, letting her body be moved by her.

By someone who isn’t Natasha.

But Natasha has an ace up her sleeve, and she pulls it out just as the butch girl smirks at her, triumphant and smug.

“Careful,” Natasha says quietly, only inches from Wanda’s face, “you never know who you’re dancing with if you don’t open your eyes.”

Wanda’s eyes fly wide open, and Natasha grins at the surprise in them. Wanda breaks into a beautiful smile, her arms dropping down and draping over Natasha’s shoulders, wrists linking at the back of Natasha’s head.

Natasha doesn’t even have to look at the other girl. She knows she won.

“I thought you were at the bar with Carol.” The silver of all the chains around Wanda’s neck glitter in the lights flashing overhead, and the green of her eyes seems to glow as they search Natasha’s. The other girl continues to dance up on Wanda valiantly, and Natasha just lets it happen for the moment.

She shrugs as her hands find Wanda’s hips, pushing down on the butch’s to clear space for her own greedy palms.

“Didn’t like how this one was touching you,” she says simply, still not looking away from Wanda.

“Oh? And why’s that?” That red mouth is pulled into a knowing smile so near to her own that it takes all of her willpower not to lick into it. 

“Because I know exactly how you need to be touched, and that’s not it.” Natasha finally looks up, raising her eyebrows under her fedora, daring the girl to say something. And she does.

“What, ‘s this your girl or somethin’?” The chick draws her shoulders back like she’s challenging Natasha, her hands falling away from Wanda for the moment.

“What if she is?” Natasha’s hand sneaks to Wanda’s back, pressing into the small of it, fingertips brushing her tailbone. Wanda is quiet against her, arms tightening around Natasha’s neck, her fingers tickling along the nape of it. 

“You shouldn’t leave somethin’ so pretty alone. Somebody else might take it.” The girl goes to grip Wanda’s hip again, and Natasha grabs her hand before she gets a finger on her, twisting it until the girl yelps in pain, trying to pull free.

“She’s not a fucking ‘it,’ Natasha says through gritted teeth, “and she’s not interested in your attention. Got it?”

“Then why don’t you let her speak for herself?” The girl finally snatches her hand back, rubbing at her sore wrist before looking down at Wanda.

Wanda who pulls back just enough to meet Natasha’s eyes again, her smile undisturbed and lovely. One of her hands slides around and grips the front of Natasha’s black tank, twisting it in her fist and pulling Natasha away from that girl, from the whole situation without a fucking word.

Natasha grins at her, letting Wanda guide them off the main floor and against the wall of the club, the whole perimeter badly lit, shadowed. She tips her fedora down low to all but hide her eyes just as Wanda’s back comes into contact with the wall.

“You know, I hate it when guys pull that shit,” Wanda says as Natasha crowds in against her, “but watching you do it was one of the sexiest things I’ve ever seen.”

Natasha gives a surprised laugh for that, sliding her arms around Wanda’s waist and pulling her in tight against her, slotting their hips together and digging in to grind against her. 

“That’s one of the unfortunate things about us dykes, babe. We can mark our territory just as good as any dude.” She glances down at Wanda’s mouth and then past it at the swell of her tits, her bra working hard to make fucking Victoria’s Secret-worthy miracles happen.

“Well, maybe I like it.” Wanda bites down on her red bottom lip, arching her back to press them harder together, only her shoulders against the wall now as the raunchy hip hop songs play on.

“Turn around and show me that ass,” Natasha murmurs right against her mouth, her fingers sliding down to dig into the meat of it. “Let me show you how good it feels to be touched just right.”

Wanda obeys immediately, turning around to face the dark wall and pushing her ass out in the most beautiful curve Natasha’s ever seen. Her dress is short, just barely covering her ass that is pushed up in the prettiest offering.

She definitely dressed to break some hearts tonight.

Natasha slides right up against her, rubbing her crotch hard against the plush of that ass, her arms wrapping around Wanda’s waist as she presses her up against the wall. She slides a hand between Wanda’s legs over her dress, digging her fingers into her cunt through her skimpy panties and giving her a dirty, firm rub while she grinds against her ass. 

Wanda whimpers, one of her own hands stealing down to cover Natasha’s, pressing it in harder, deeper, her head falling back to rest on Natasha’s shoulder.

“Like that?” Natasha whispers in her ear.

Wanda nods, her eyes closed, red mouth parted up at the dark ceiling.

“You’re so lucky I don’t have a dick,” she tells her, her voice pitched as low as a man’s, her clit throbbing with the desire to be inside of Wanda somehow. “I’d push this dress up and fuck you right here. Come right in that sweet pussy. And you’d let me, wouldn’t you? Let me in right here.”

She pushes up on Wanda’s cunt, would be inside of her if her panties weren’t in the way.

“Yes,” Wanda whispers. “Yeah, I’d let you.”

“Fuck,” Natasha growls, her other hand joining the first between Wanda’s legs, tugging her dress up and sliding under her panties, fingers getting soaked immediately because of how much slick Wanda is dripping out. “God, I’m gonna fuck you up. C’mon.”

She grabs Wanda’s hand and pulls her away from the wall, going slow because Wanda seems to be a little shaky on her feet. They push through the crowd, aiming for the light in the back corner where the bathroom is.

Natasha pushes the door open, not paying attention to the girl at the sink putting on lipstick or the sex that’s happening in the first stall. She yanks Wanda in against her the second they’re inside, her hands gripping her rough all over when she kisses her for the first time, smearing Wanda’s pretty red lipstick as she licks hungrily into her mouth.

Wanda clings to her, nails scratching over Natasha’s back where she’s trying to hold on. Natasha grabs her ass and lifts her with her grip on it, walking them back until Wanda is propped up on the sink. 

“Take your panties off and put ‘em in my back pocket,” Natasha breathes against her mouth, kissing her deep and dirty while Wanda does as told. She watches her move, fighting to get them off and lifting her legs where she’s sitting on the sink so she can slide them off. Natasha feels her hand as she stuffs the panties into her pocket.

“Good girl,” she murmurs, flicking her tongue between Wanda’s parted lips and nipping at the bottom one. She reaches down and tugs up on Wanda’s dress, yanking it up her hips so that her naked cunt is right there, completely bare and smooth, glistening in the low light of the bathroom. Natasha drags her nails softly along the inside of Wanda’s right thigh, drawing up goosebumps before she runs her fingers just barely up Wanda’s slit, dragging a gasp and a jolt out of her. Her fingers come away wet.

“So pretty.” She squeezes her outer lips together, feeling the hard line of her clit underneath all that softness. She’s pretty sure there’s someone watching them now, but she can’t look away from Wanda. She steps in against her again, keeping her hand between them as she strokes so soft over her cunt. She kisses at Wanda’s panting mouth, staring straight into her eyes. “I’m gonna fuck you so hard.”

“Yeah,” Wanda whispers, nodding as she searches Natasha’s eyes pleadingly. She spreads her legs around Natasha’s body, pushing her hips up, rubbing against Natasha’s teasing fingers. “God, I need you to. Needed it for so long.”

“Yeah, you have.” Natasha kisses down Wanda’s chin, sucking on the curve of it before continuing down to her throat. “Cause you knew I could take care of this pussy, didn’t you?” She pulls Wanda’s legs around her waist, running her nails all the way from her ankles to her hipbones before she works her left hand between her legs again. She rubs the very tip of Wanda’s clit with the wet pad of her thumb.

Wanda nods again, her eyes shining like she’s going to cry, like she needs it that bad. Natasha’s eyes burn into hers while she slides her middle and ring fingers straight up inside of her, into all of that juicy, throbbing pink, and Wanda gasps like she’s been shot.

“Just like that, right? Need it just like that.” She curls her fingers toward herself, sinking them right into the spongy softness of Wanda’s g-spot. Wanda wraps her arms around Natasha’s neck, hugging up close to her and knocking Natasha’s fedora to the floor so she can bury her face in her sweaty hair. Natasha brushes over Wanda’s clit with her thumb again, feeling her entire body shake with it.

“Gimme those tits. Get ‘em out,” she says against Wanda’s collarbone, watching as Wanda’s shaky hands move her necklaces to drape down her back and pull the top of her dress down, her red bra going with it, and God, there they are, those wet-dream breasts already flushed, nipples painfully hard. Natasha licks her lips, her fingers locked in Wanda’s cunt. She tucks her head down and buries her face in those tits, taking a deep breath to soak up the clean, sweaty smell of them.

Wanda pushes her tits together around Natasha’s face, capturing her in them and trapping Natasha in the second best place in the world. She starts to fuck her then, keeping her fingers curled while she thrusts in and out of her, going patient and steady, keeping her thumb just barely grazing Wanda’s now beautifully hard clit.

She tucks her forefinger in and pushes up deep inside of her, making Wanda cry out against her ear, her hands falling away from her breasts and wrapping around Natasha’s neck again. Natasha turns her head and draws one of those pretty nipples into her mouth, biting at it before she starts to suck on it.

Her right hand grips Wanda’s ass, keeping her steady while Wanda starts to lose control, starts to slip off of the sink in her attempts to ride Natasha’s hand. Her legs unwrap from Natasha’s waist when she starts to come, thighs spreading as she clutches at Natasha, getting the leverage she needs to bear down on Natasha’s too-slow thrusts, pushing her clit against Natasha’s thumb and grinding on it, pulling an orgasm out of herself that is slow and spreading and shattering.

“That’s it, baby. Get it. Take it from me, fuckin’ get it.” She lifts up to watch Wanda come, watching the flush spread from her face all the way down her tits and up her thighs, the way her eyes are squeezed shut and sweat is dripping down her neck, the way her mouth is swollen from kisses and smeared with lipstick, and she’s coming so hard it looks painful. Her sobs echo off the walls inside the tiny bathroom, the wet sounds of her pussy under Natasha’s strong hand absolutely filthy and so fucking loud.

Just when Wanda starts to come down, her body loosening the slightest bit, pussy muscles unclenching where they’re pulsing around her hand, Natasha pushes her pinky into her and locks her hand inside to the knuckles.

“Ohmygod,” Wanda whispers, her eyes flying open wide, her fucked-out body almost slipping off of the sink. Natasha growls low in appreciation when Wanda’s cunt grips her tight, draws her in deeper. She leans over then, eye level with Wanda’s tits again so she can watch them jiggle and shudder while Wanda gets fucked this time.

“This is the hungriest little cunt I’ve ever felt,” she whispers against Wanda’s tits, tongue flicking out to tease at her nipples. “I bet you’d take my whole fist if I wanted you to.”

“Fuck me fuck me fuck me,” Wanda gasps, arms back now to grip the sink behind her, leaning back on it and spreading her legs even more. Natasha takes a step back so she can get the perfect angle and she does just that; pounding most of her hand into Wanda’s cunt as slick drips all the way down to her wrist, thumb banging into her clit roughly with each push. The muscles in her arm are aching, her teeth gritted as she fucks her as hard as she can, pulling another orgasm from Wanda that is so violent she’s screaming and sliding down completely off the sink to sit on Natasha’s hand, putting all of her weight down on it as she comes all over it.

“Godfuckingdamn,” Natasha grits out, staring up at Wanda in awe as come drips all over the floor and all the way down her arm as she keeps massaging at her insides, drawing out every tiny climax she can from Wanda. “God, that was so fucking hot. Fuck, look at this.”

She pulls her hand out of her and lifts it up to show Wanda who is resting back against the mirror, boneless and barely conscious while she breathes hard, her breasts heaving. Natasha spreads her fingers to show her how covered they are in sticky sweet slick. 

She licks her hand clean like it’s covered in honey, relishing every single salty-sweet drop of it. Her tongue runs over her lips when she’s done, so hungry for it now that she’s ravenous.

“One more.” She drops to her knees.

“Oh god,” Wanda whines, trying to close her legs even as she’s sliding her fingers into Natasha’s hair. “Oh god, I can’t. Nat, I can’t I--”

“Look at that,” Natasha whispers to herself after she pries Wanda’s thighs back apart. She’s staring right at Wanda’s cunt that is so wet it’s dripping; long, syrupy lines dripping slowly to the floor, her whole pussy swollen and deep pink, slightly gaped from Natasha’s hand and still pulsing from her last orgasm.

She closes her eyes and pushes her face right into it, burying her nose and her mouth in and rubbing it hard back and forth, smothering herself in it as Wanda grips her hair hard and hauls her in to stay where she is. She pushes one hand down into her jeans, moaning when she finally finds her clit, getting it trapped between her thumb and forefinger so she can jack it off while she eats this gorgeous pussy.

She starts to lap at her, the sound of it so wet and so clear it’s bouncing off the tile around them. She slides her tongue in and fucks her with it, nestling her nose right underneath Wanda’s clit and letting her grind down on it, letting her ride her face toward another orgasm.

Wanda falls back against the mirror when she comes this time, her eyes rolling back in her head, her fingers shaking they’re gripping Natasha’s hair so hard. Natasha jacks her own clit furiously, coming right along with her while she all but suffocates in a flood of come. She drinks it all down, sucking her pussy clean and moaning the whole time she licks her out.

“Stop,” Wanda begs, her voice raw, barely recognizable. “Stop, please, I’m gonna die.”

Natasha grins, giving that beautiful pussy a kiss goodbye before she stands up again on shaky legs. Wanda looks like a used-up fuckdoll, her tits hanging out of her dress, legs spread to show off her wrecked cunt, her whole body flushed as she stares up at Natasha from under her eyelashes.

“How you feelin’?” Natasha steps in between those legs again, sliding her hands down to drag them around her waist once more. She tucks Wanda back into her bra and then into her dress and gathers her up in her arms, pulling her up and pressing a deep kiss to her pliant mouth.

“Like that was the first orgasm I ever really had.” Wanda wraps her arms loosely around Natasha’s neck, pulling her closer with her legs and letting herself be kissed, like she’s too exhausted to do anything but keep her mouth parted for her.

Natasha laughs, wrapping her own arms around Wanda’s waist and hugging her close, their tummies pressed together.

“You mean the first three orgasms?”

“Jesus Christ,” Wanda mumbles, a whole new flush of pink spreading over her cheeks. Their grinning mouths slide together, noses nudging as they kiss. “That was amazing.”

“You’re so fuckin’ beautiful,” Natasha whispers against her mouth, her face falling into absolute seriousness before she presses a single, chaste kiss to Wanda’s lips. 

“Can I…?” Wanda moves a hand between them, fingers tugging at the button on Natasha’s jeans before she twists her hips away, shaking her head.

“No, I’m good. I promise, I came everyfuckingwhere. You were so hot, I couldn’t help it.” Natasha takes a step back and helps Wanda down from the sink, only letting her go when she’s sure she can stand. 

“God, your whole face is wet.” Wanda buries her face in her hands, hiding an embarrassed laugh before she looks up again, giving her an adorable, sympathetic pout. “I’m sorry.”

Natasha answers by running her fingers over her face and sucking them clean before leaning in to kiss her again, pushing the taste of her own come into her mouth.

“See? You taste like heaven. Don’t apologize to me.” She grabs a paper towel from the stack on the sink, using it to carefully wipe Wanda’s face clean of lipstick and sweat. “There. Now you look like a good girl again.”

“I’m not wearing panties,” Wanda murmurs shyly, tugging down on her dress. “I can’t look like a good girl.”

“I’m keepin’ those. Now we’re even.” Natasha pats her back pocket and leans down to pick up her fedora, dropping it onto Wanda’s head and tugging her under her arm. “C’mon. I’ll get us a cab back to the motel.”

 

The cab ride home is quiet, the two of them tucked in close to each other, Natasha’s hand running obsessively over Wanda’s bare legs and Wanda stroking over the back of Natasha’s hand, over her healing knuckles, like she’s amazed that these were the fingers that made her come so hard.

They go their separate ways once they get back, a wordless agreement that ends with a deep, almost desperate kiss in front of the band’s door. Wanda pulls away finally, meeting Natasha’s gaze with a sweet smile.

“Goodnight,” she whispers.

Natasha watches her walk away, watches her until she opens the door and disappears into the room she’s sharing with Simon, not moving until the door clicks closed again.

She unbinds her tits and changes into pajamas, collapsing down on the empty bed in the empty room with the air conditioner running full blast. She turns light off and stares up into the dark.

Surely to god that was a dream.

Her phone vibrates beside her on the bed, the screen lighting up the room.

_i can still feel you inside of me. i’m so sore in the best way. i’m so happy i feel like i’m dreaming._

Natasha whines, so fucking gone for this girl she can barely move. She holds the phone up over her head and types out a reply.

_i want you in my bed right now so i can make you come one more time. you’d sleep so good and i wouldn’t let you go all night_

_i can still smell you on my hand. i’ve never craved something so much in my life_

_sleep well. come over first thing in the morning. i already miss you._

Such. A fucking. Sap. She’s blushing at her own ridiculousness, but there’s no one to see it, especially in the dark.

A final text comes through.

_sweet dreams. you’ll be in mine <3_


	6. love is how it's lost, not how it's found

“Are drums really necessary?” Natasha grunts as she drags the case containing Sif’s drumkit out of the back of the bus and down the oh-so useful ramp installed on it. She digs her heels in so she doesn’t slip down the slick surface as the rain pours down overhead. “Can’t she just… bang on trashcan lids? It’d be fuckin’ lighter.”

Sharon and Kamala are nursing hangovers (along with ¾ of Pussy Party), so Simon, Natasha, and Wanda are helping Maria unload and set up for tonight’s show while they sleep it off back at the motel before heading over for soundcheck later. 

“I ask myself that every time I do this,” Maria replies with a smile as she grabs the other end of the drumkit case and helps Natasha get it down the ramp. “Thanks, by the way. For helping.”

“It’s no problem. What else would I be doing?” She walks backwards with it into the building, out of the rain for the moment but it beats down overhead on the old tin roof.

“Oh, I don’t know. Finding some way to be snuggled up with--”

“Is that everything? Please tell me that’s everything,” Simon pants, looking like a drowned rat in designer jeans as he blinks pitifully at Natasha and Maria. They exchange a quick glance before Maria gives a nod, smiling at him sympathetically.

“We’re good, Simon. Thanks for your help. There’s just a couple more things and we’ll be done.”

“Brilliant. I’ve gotta have a word with the owner. He wants us to open for some shit-ass fuckin’ ska band tonight.” His eyes widen as he sneers in disbelief. “Don’t worry. I’ll take care of it.”

Natasha grins at Maria as they head back outside.

“Are there seriously still ska bands?” she laughs the second before she’s nearly knocked over by a wet, unknown force in the doorway. She braces, and putting her hands out to keep herself and whoever it is on their feet.

“Sorry! Shit, sorry. I was trying to hurry, and--” Wanda rushes out, gripping Darcy’s bass case like it’s a shield as she looks up at Natasha, her eyes massive, eyeliner running down her wet face, her hair absolutely soaked and falling in dripping strands around her face. 

“Hey, hey,” Natasha says softly, taking the bass and handing it off to Maria who is smirking, all knowing and amused like she knows exactly how hard Natasha made Wanda come last night. Natasha ignores her and pulls her own jacket off to get to the hoodie underneath. She strips out of it and doesn’t say a word as she drapes it over Wanda’s shivering shoulders, tugging the hood up on her head while Wanda slides her hands through the long sleeves.

“My evil plan worked.” Wanda zips the hoodie up and pushes her hands into the pockets, still looking absolutely drowned but she’s smiling.

“Oh, yeah?” Natasha shrugs her leather jacket back on and grins at her girl, raising an eyebrow at her as she takes a step closer. “And what plan was that?”

“To get to wear your clothes.” She pulls her hands out of her pockets and wraps her arms around herself, giving herself a squeeze and managing to look like softness embodied even as she drips water. Natasha feels a pang of affection so strong she has to take a few seconds to collect herself. She slides a hand around Wanda’s waist and moves them out of the doorway and into the shadowed corner next to it where they’re surrounded by speakers and amps and cases, hidden just for the moment.

“Why? Because you know how much it turns me on to see you in my clothes?” Wanda’s wearing those tiny shorts again, and Natasha has permission this time to get her hands on them. She tucks her hands down into her back pockets and grips her plush little ass, giving it a squeeze and smirking at how readily Wanda arches into her.

“I love how you dress,” Wanda whispers in the darkness between them, making a quiet, pleased sound at the firm way Natasha kneads her ass through her shorts. Wanda reaches up and tugs on the bill of the backwards Yankees cap Natasha is wearing, biting down on her bottom lip as she does. 

“Like how butch I am, don’t you?” Natasha pushes her voice lower than usual, walking them back until Wanda is against the wall and she can step between her legs a little, spread her open.

Wanda nods, quick and breathless, arms draping over Natasha’s shoulders. She’s still got her bottom lip caught between her teeth, and she doesn’t know how close she is to getting fucked right here.

“Like a guy but sexier than any guy could ever be. Ever,” Wanda confesses, tongue sliding out over her bottom lip. Natasha can’t see in the dark, but she knows Wanda’s face is flushed. “Nat?”

“Mm?”

“Can I… I want to see you naked.”

Natasha raises her eyebrows.

“Right now?”

Wanda ducks her head, the top of her hood brushing Natasha’s forehead. Natasha smiles and runs her hands from Wanda’s ass up to her back, hugging her flush against her body.

“No,” Wanda says, soft and embarrassed. “Just… later. Sometime.”

Natasha’s taken little smile is hidden, thank god. She lowers her head to nuzzle Wanda’s up, their mouths brushing.

“Yeah, sweet girl. Of course.”

“Nat?” Wanda’s nails drag over the nape of Natasha’s neck, dragging a shiver out of her and making her push her hips tighter to Wanda’s.

“What, babe?”

Wanda drags her mouth from Natasha’s, sliding it over her cheek and stopping at her ear. Her voice is soft as sin.

“I love your hands on my ass. Makes it so easy to imagine your fingers inside of it.”

Well, goddamn.

Natasha’s hands are back on that ass so fast she jars them both. She bypasses Wanda’s pockets and rubs at the frayed cut-offs just the curves of it, savoring Wanda’s gasp when she pushes up hard, worming her way under denim but overtop her lacy panties to rub her soft, warm ass.

“Does he not give this beautiful thing any attention?” Natasha kisses at Wanda’s throat, tongue pressed to her pulsepoint. Wanda shakes her head in response, grinding back against her hands almost desperately.

“Won’t do me there,” Wanda pants against Natasha’s ear. “Even though I love it.”

“Jesus fuck, Wanda.” She lifts her head up and kisses her probably too rough on the mouth, one of her hands sliding up to hold her around the waist again, fingers digging into the softness of her hip. The sudden sound of voices--male voices--approaching makes them stop, both of them pulling back and staring at each other wide-eyed in the dark.

Natasha steps back and grabs one end of the drum case, pulling it further into the room and Wanda pushes from the other side just as Simon and a scrawny, balding guy with a cigarette round the corner and head for the still-open doorway.

Simon stops and scoffs at them.

“Are you girls not done yet? See, this is why I said we needed to hire--”

“All done,” Maria interrupts as she steps into the building again, soaked from head to toe but she’s carrying two guitar cases and the bag of cords. “Getting set up for soundcheck now. What is it you usually say, Simon? Calm your tits? Yeah. That’s it.”

Maria pushes past Simon and toward the stage, leaving Simon surprised and the club owner laughing. Natasha rolls her eyes and abandons the charade, walking around the case to stand next to Wanda.

“The rest of the band’ll be here in the next hour or so,” she tells Simon, hands on her hips, shoulders back, trying to look as imposing as she can. At five foot four, she has to pull out every single stop. “You don’t have to be here anymore, if you have something else you need to do.”

“Wanda said she’s going to make us dinner tonight. Didn’t you, babe?” Simon grabs Wanda around the waist and pulls her to his side, grinning like a man who think he’s in charge.

Wanda looks shy again, and Natasha is reminded painfully of the first time she met her, how invisible Wanda seemed then. She will never, ever let that happen again.

“Oh, yeah?” She gives Wanda a sweet smile, lifting her foot to nudge Wanda’s calf. “What’re you gonna make us?”

Wanda shrugs in Simon’s grip, lifting her eyes to meet Natasha’s with a smile.

“Whatever you want,” she replies, and it’s so fucking suggestive that Natasha has to bite her lips to keep from saying what she wants.

“Spaghetti with meatballs. And garlic bread.” It’s Steve’s speciality, and she’s missed it lately, missed being home. She has too much pride to admit all of that, but Wanda seems to see something in her eyes because her smile softens.

“Done.” Wanda tucks her hands into the sleeves of her hoodie and wraps her arms around herself again. Simon tugs her toward the door, calling back behind him.

“We’ll see you back at the hotel. Kitchen’s in our room, so meet us there when you lot are done.”

“Sure,” Natasha replies, too quiet to be heard. Wanda glances back, her face barely visible around the side of the hood, her smile soft and secret as she mouths _bye._

Natasha grins at her, not giving a second glance to the club owner who is watching them with growing curiosity. 

“By the way, if you try to put us on after a ska band, I’ll come up on stage during their show and play the trumpet with my twat.” She claps him on the arm and walks off to find Maria.

 

“Ohmygoooodddd,” Darcy moans as she shuffles like an especially pretty zombie toward Simon and Wanda’s room. They smelled the garlic and the tomato sauce the second they piled out of the bus, and Natasha has to admit that her stomach is yelling at her for not eating all day. “Bread. I smell bread.”

She knocks loudly on the door.

“GIMME FOOD.”

“Is that really how you knock on doors, Darcy? My god. Your poor parents,” Simon says as he opens the door, barely finishing his last sentence because Darcy is pushing him out of the way and rushing over to Wanda to throw her arms around her neck.

“I love you. I know we don’t talk much and there’s some weird shit because of… well, stuff, but I fuckin’ love you.”

Wanda’s eyes are wide but she pats Darcy’s back with a smile anyway, putting down the handful of plastic forks on top of the stack of paper plates.

“Just in time. I pulled the garlic bread out of the--Darcy, be careful it’s probably really--”

“Ahhhhh,” Darcy cries, trying to eat the bread in her mouth and escape it at the same time. “Fukkinhot!”

“Plates, ladies. Serve yourselves,” Simon says, pointing them over to the tiny kitchen counter where Wanda has everything set up. 

They pile food on their plates and grab cans of soda or bottles of beer from the cooler beside the bed and settle in on any surface they can find to stuff their faces. Kamala turns the TV on Cartoon Network, and pretty soon they’re all wrapped up in _Steven Universe_ , no sounds but the television and the crunch of garlic bread.

Natasha opens the door that leads out onto the balcony and motions silently for Wanda to follow her. It’s still pouring rain as they sit down on the damp concrete floor with their plates in their laps. Natasha cuts into a meatball and swirls it up with some perfectly cooked spaghetti, glancing over to find Wanda watching her almost nervously. She stuffs it into her mouth without a single thought for grace.

“Ohmygod,” she mumbles, closing her eyes while she chews, pretending for just a second that she’s back home and maybe Wanda and Steve made the spaghetti together, both of her sweet, good-hearted loves in the kitchen together for hours, sharing stories and being gentle with each other’s hearts while they cook. It’s enough to bring tears to her eyes.

“Is it okay? I might’ve called Bucky and gotten a recipe. I was nervous and I didn’t know--”

Natasha swallows, glancing quickly over into the room through the glass door to make sure no one is looking before she leans over and kisses Wanda, soft and tender and loaded with probably too much emotion.

“You’re a dream,” she murmurs against her mouth. 

Wanda grins.

“Does that mean it’s okay?”

“It’s perfect. It’s… it’s home.” Another kiss, just one more before she pulls away again, turning her attention to her food. She feels Wanda’s eyes on her still, feels the affection emanating from her that matches her own. Natasha scoots closer to her, their thighs pressed together as they lean back against the glass door and stare out into the grey afternoon, sharing a meal and not needing another word between them.

 

They head back to the motel almost immediately after the show, still wiped from the night before and from loading up the bus in the absolute downpour that started as soon as the show ended.

Natasha is in the bathroom washing her face, staring at her reflection and the perpetual dark circles under her eyes when her phone buzzes on the sink.

_simon’s gone for 20 mins. want to come help me get ready for bed? ;)_

“Nat, _shit_ , watch where you’re going!” Sif yelps when Natasha nearly plows her down on the way out the door. “What the hell!?”

“I’m, uh.” Natasha pauses in the open doorway, chewing on the inside of her cheek. “I’m going to get some ice.”

She pulls the door closed behind her, ignoring Carol’s yell of “you forgot the ice bucket!” and rushing down the sidewalk to Wanda’s room.

Wanda answers the door in a towel that she’s holding up just beneath her armpit, her hair unbrushed and wet down her naked arms. Natasha doesn’t blink as she takes in the sight of her.

“Y-You… you, uh,” she starts seductively.

Wanda grins, reaching out and grabbing her by her Pixies shirt and dragging her into the room, closing the door behind them.

“Wanted you to help me pick out what to wear to bed,” she says as she leans over, digging around in her suitcase and coming up with two different handfuls of tiny-looking things. Natasha sinks down on the edge of the bed, staring up at Wanda like she’s Santa holding two wrapped presents.

“Don’t suppose there’s time for you to model them both for me, is there?”

Wanda grins, setting the gray pile down on the desk and holding up the baby blue, sheer top that is little more than a bra and bottoms that look like old-fashioned bloomers. “Okay, this one, or--”

She puts those down and grabs the gray ones, holding up a little jersey camisole and matching panties, lace rimming the edges of both. Natasha licks her lips, her very vivid imagination coming into play as she takes both of them into consideration.

“Is he going to fuck you tonight?” She glances up at Wanda’s face, searching for honesty there. Wanda lowers the camisole, looking a little bashful to be talking about it so frankly, but she shakes her head.

“No. He thinks I started my period. He won’t touch me the whole week. So, which one?” She peels the towel off, dropping it on the floor, standing in front of Natasha completely naked for the first time, her skin tan from the summer sun and soft with lotion, and there’s not a thing in the world between that beautiful body and Natasha. Nothing at all.

“Neither one. Fuck, neither one. Look at you,” she says quietly, standing up from the bed and coming to a stop in front of her, memorizing her tits, the soft curves of her hips and her tummy, her sweet, bare little cunt, and the press of flesh where her thighs touch. “So fuckin’ beautiful.”

She cups Wanda’s breasts in her unworthy hands, lifting them up gently and ducking her head to kiss at the swell of them, tipping one up to tongue at her nipple before she kisses down quickly to Wanda’s stomach. She buries her face in the softness of it, taking a deep breath of clean, warm skin before kissing down to the naked mound between her legs.

“He’ll be back soon,” Wanda reminds her, her voice pitched low and breathy. She’s stroking Natasha’s damp hair back from her face, just holding onto it like she can’t decide if she wants to haul her in closer or drag her to stand up again.

“Yeah,” Natasha sighs, kissing up to one of her hipbones and over her ribs on her way up to her feet again. She licks her lips and leans in for a quick kiss on Wanda’s mouth, smiling for how shy she’s being, standing here naked as Venus in the middle of the room. “Okay, the grey one. It looks more comfortable.”

“Help me?” Wanda hands her the cami and the panties, standing pliant and so trusting in front of Natasha. She can’t put her finger on it, but she can tell this is something important, a new page in their story. She takes extra care with sliding the little top over Wanda’s head, helping her arms under the straps like Wanda’s a little girl. She tugs it down over her body, smoothing it out over her stomach and adjusting her breasts into the cups. She drops to her knees to help with the panties, sliding them up over her silken thighs and letting the lacy waistband snug right beneath her hips. She stares up at her from her knees and finds herself being watched just as closely, just as lovingly.

She wants to wrap her arms around her waist and hug her. She wants to pull her forward to rub against her face until she soaks those little panties. She wants to steal her away from this whole dog and pony show and take them somewhere they can be honest. 

She stands up instead.

She’s not ready to leave, and the way Wanda is fidgeting with the worn hem of Natasha’s shirt tells her it’s mutual.

“Help me brush my hair?” comes the next quiet question. Wanda can’t seem to meet her eyes. “It gets a lot of tangles, and it can be--”

“Yeah,” Natasha agrees, because of course, anything. “Yeah, where’s your brush?”

Wanda disappears into the bathroom and comes back with a bottle of something and a wide-tooth comb. She sits on the floor in front of the only chair in the room, passing both of them back to Natasha.

“Spray that into my hair and kinda rub it in? And then you can comb it.”

Natasha obeys, squirting the stuff that smells kind of like coconut and something a little salty, like the ocean. She rubs it in carefully until it makes Wanda’s hair softer, a little more slick, and then she takes the comb to it.

“I haven’t had long hair since I was really little,” she confesses, using her other hand to hold the strands still while she brushes so she doesn’t pull her hair. “I was never very good at being a girl.”

“You’re doing good,” Wanda promises, sounding far away, maybe a sleepy. “Feels so good, Nat.”

“So much hair,” Natasha teases, giving it a little tug before moving one section over to the ‘brushed’ side. “It must take you forever to do by yourself.”

“You were so sexy up there tonight,” Wanda says out of nowhere, like she’d been holding it in long enough. “I was just… I was watching you up there and thinking…”

She trails off like she’s lost her nerve, her hair moving in Natasha’s hands as she shakes her head.

“What were you thinking, beautiful?”

“That all these girls were looking at you, but you were looking at me. That it didn’t matter how gorgeous some of them were or… or anything else. That… that--”

“That I was yours?” She runs her hands through Wanda’s hair that is all smooth and tangle-free now, leaning down to press a kiss to the top of her dark, damp head. Wanda tips her head back to look up at Natasha, her face so sweet and open, her smile lighting up the whole room.

“Yeah,” she says softly.

“Well, maybe I am.” She curls down, her fingers trailing along Wanda’s ears as she kisses from her forehead down the sweet line of her nose to her smiling mouth, awkward to be kissing upside down but it’s good. It’s so, so fucking good.

The sound of a key in the lock makes them both jump, Natasha’s nose hitting Wanda’s chin.

“Shit,” she gasps with a laugh, sitting back in the chair and running the comb through Wanda’s hair, just praying to Satan that her nose isn’t bleeding.

“They were out of that Kotex brand you like so I--” Simon stops when he sees Natasha, the plastic bag swaying in his grip. “Oh, hey, Nat. Didn’t, uh. Expect to see you.”

“Oh, I just brought her an emergency tampon and we started talking,” Natasha shrugs, running her hands through Wanda’s hair now just to prolong her stay by a few seconds, but she finally stands up and tugs her boxers into place. “Cool of you to go buy crotch swabs this late, dude.”

Simon wrinkles his nose, the box of tampons halfway out of the bag.

“Ew.”

Natasha grins, setting the comb down on the table and taking a couple of steps toward the door.

“Alright, well. I guess I’m going to bed. Later, you two.”

She pauses in the doorway, looking back at Wanda who is sitting just where she left her, looking like everything good in this world.

“Goodnight, Nat. Thanks for your help.” Wanda gives her a quick flash of a grin and a little wave of her fingers.

“Any time, cutie. Night.” She takes one last look at her before leaving, heading back to her own room and her crowded but still lonely bed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> comments are welcome. well... not welcome, pleaded for. please. i hope there are people out there still reading this story. :/


	7. so dirty on the inside

“Hey, Tash. How’s it going?”

Steve sound exhausted but there’s a smile in his voice, and both of those things make Natasha ache. She’s smoking a cigarette in the parking lot at the motel, walking back and forth on painted lines for parking spaces that are so faded they barely exist.

“I’m good. Guess what, Stevie? If I stand riiiiight…” She shuffles, standing up on her tippiest tip toes, craning her head, and squinting. “Here! I can see the ocean!”

Steve snorts in a very Steve-like way, and Natasha grins because she can tell he’s doing the same.

“Just right there, huh? Sounds like you’re at a pretty classy place.”

“At the Evergreen Motel right off the highway. And the room legit smells like one of those pine tree air fresheners pedophiles hang from their rearview.” She takes a drag and exhales up into the balmy, late afternoon air.

“Hell, you better get the number of the owner. Tony might be interested in doing a timeshare.” Steve’s voice goes distant as he holds the phone away from his mouth. “Just throw ‘em in the dryer for me, will ya? Thanks, Sam.”

Natasha walks around the side of the building where there’s a little patch of grass and sits down, leaning back against the building. She closes her eyes and listens to the sounds of home.

“I miss you,” she says softly.

“Hey, don’t do that,” Steve chides, gentle and sad in a way that only Steve can be. “You’re on tour! You’re in Charleston and you can almost see the ocean if you stand right there! You’ll be home soon enough and get sick of sitting still again. Savor what you’ve got goin’, you hear me?”

“Yessir,” she replies just to make him laugh. She pulls her legs up to her chest and wraps her arms around them. “How’s Bucky?”

“He’s alright. Had a rough few days, but he slept all night last night, so I think we’re on the way back up.” He pauses. “How’s it going with Wanda?”

“Mm,” Natasha replies, exhaling smoke on a sigh and smiling down at her bare toes. “She’s… beautiful. Delicious. Magical. Dorky. Perfect. Yanno.”

“This is so weird. You’ve never been this gone for a girl. Not even back when you thought you were in love with Sif for a whole week. Or that… whole thing with Darcy. It’s kind of amazing.”

“This is different.” She wiggles her toes in the grass, the cigarette burning away between her fingers. “The way we are together is different. You know?”

“Tell me.” Steve sighs like he’s settling in, like he’s just sprawled out on the bed and maybe he’s got Bucky curled up against his chest. Natasha licks her lips, nervous about saying these things out loud while she’s completely sober, but it’s Steve. No one but Steve.

“I’ve always... I grew up around you and Bucky, seeing you two together. And who you two are now is just… who you were always going to be to each other. It was destiny. Inevitable. Does that make sense?”

“Perfect sense,” Steve replies softly.

“And so I’ve always wanted that for myself. In some dark corner of my black little heart. Like… I know I’m not very good at relationship… stuff--”

“Understatement,” Steve interjects with a laugh.

“--But,” Natasha presses on, holding in a laugh of her own, “That doesn’t mean I’ve never wanted one. It’s just always… I’ve wanted that feeling, like you and Bucky. That fateful feeling. That inevitability. And I’ve just never felt it before now.”

Steve stays quiet, and Natasha waits him out, lets him sift through it all in that careful way he has that makes her trust every word that comes out of his mouth.

“Is she still with him? Simon?”

“Well…” She flicks her cigarette, shifting nervously, like Steve can see her. “Yeah. But it’s… like this is a really complicated situation.”

“Is it?”

“Yeah, Steve! It is. She’s dating our fucking tour manager. And _we’re on tour._ A little complicated.”

“Have you two talked about it?”

“About what? The implosion that would happen if she told him? Or broke up with him?”

“No, Nat. About… _you_. What you are to each other. Are you dating? Is she your girlfriend?”

“She can’t be my girlfriend if she’s somebody else’s girlfriend,” Natasha mumbles, her shoulders curling in.

“Exactly,” Steve says carefully. “Is that what you want? For her to be your girlfriend?”

“I dunno.” Natasha frowns, shifting again and taking a quick drag off her cigarette. “It hasn’t really… I mean, it’s not exactly an option right now. So I guess I just haven’t thought about it a lot.”

“Well, maybe you need to.”

“Maybe,” she sighs, putting her cigarette out on the brick wall and tucking the butt behind her ear. 

“Is that what she wants?”

“Hm?”

“To be your girlfriend? To date you?” 

“Dunno.” It settles like a weight on her chest, and suddenly it hurts to breathe. “There really hasn’t been time to talk about it. This all just… it’s just kind of happened.”

“ _Make_ the time,” Steve replies. “Be honest with each other. It’s the number one rule. The most important thing in relationships. You know that. If you wanna use me and Buck as an example, you know how honest we are. Even when it hurts.”

“But I don’t want it to hurt.” Natasha is all but whispering now, tears burning at the back of her eyes.

“You’ve just got to decide if it’s worth hurting over. Don’t lie to yourself, Nat. You deserve honesty, especially from yourself.”

“I’ve gotta go, Steve.” She swallows thickly, pushing to her feet and dragging a hand through her greasy hair. 

“I love you,” he replies, one of the two people in Natasha’s whole life who could say that to her and she’d believe them. She wants to add a third. She wants so, so desperately to add a third. 

“Me, too.”

She’s never said it, not to anyone. And maybe she wants that, too. More than anything else.

 

She’d done an embarrassing amount of planning. A trip to two different sex shops and a series of phonecalls had taken three hours, and now she’s standing in front of Wanda, hoping she’ll say yes.

“Are you sure?” Wanda is breathless with excitement, her eyes wide as she searches Natasha’s. 

“Yeah, if you wanna go.” Natasha sounds much more casual than she is, infinitely more relaxed, but she’s had a lifetime to perfect that exact sort of apathy. Inside, her heart is about to pound out of her chest. “The room is ready for us right now. Right on the beach.”

“What’s the story?” Wanda says in a whisper, her eyes already darting around the room, mentally packing. Natasha grins.

 

“Wait, what?” Simon is texting while he’s talking as always, though he’s finding plenty of time to glare at Wanda. Their bags are packed, a car is rented, and Natasha is standing right by her side with her arms crossed over her chest while Darcy paces nervously in the corridor between the rooms. “You’re leaving?”

“Just for tonight, Simon! Don’t be so dramatic.” Wanda grins, and takes a step toward him, cupping his cheek with a smile that Natasha has to look away from. “We’re just going to visit Nat’s aunt. She lives close by and she wants me to meet her. She’s an anthropologist!”

“You haven’t even gotten your degree yet,” Simon shoots back, ducking away from Wanda’s outreached hand. “Why don’t you go have dinner with her? Why do you have to stay the fucking night?”

“It’s just easier,” Natasha adds with a shrug. “She’s got plenty of room, and we can drink as much as we want and not having to worry about getting back.”

“Well, what if I bloody need you here? Huh? There’s phonecalls to make, venues to talk to. We’re in the middle of a fucking tour, Wanda! Stop acting like a fucking child for once in your goddamn--”

He reaches for Wanda, and Natasha steps in to intercept, snatching his wrist in mid-air and digging in just as firmly as she learned in Krav Maga, staring straight into his eyes with her jaw set. She twists his arm without looking away, just a little, watching the panic in his eyes.

“We’re going,” she says calm, low. “You don’t pay her, so she is not obligated to stay here and be your slave. We’ll be back for soundcheck tomorrow. Step back, Simon.”

She releases him and pushes him back to help him on his way. She doesn’t realize that she’s tensed to fight, fucking ready for it, the blood coursing through her veins, her skin tight with the need for release. She hasn’t even blinked.

Simon doesn’t say a fucking word.

“Go ahead and get in the car,” she tells Wanda without looking away from Simon. She takes a step back when she hears the passenger door open, almost turned and headed toward the car herself when Simon finally speaks.

“Just because she has a pathetic crush on you doesn’t mean she knows you, Wanda!” He’s near the motel now, hand on his doorknob like a coward. Natasha turns to watch him with a raised eyebrow, and if her smirk looks deadly, that’s because it is. “But I bet you just love the attention, don’t you? Just soak it right up.”

“Shut the fuck up, Simon.” Those words out of Wanda’s mouth surprise everyone present, no one more than Wanda. Natasha looks over to find her eyes wide, hand up to her mouth as a flush spreads over her cheeks. She recovers quickly, turning her attention to Natasha, practically pleading. “Let’s go.”

Natasha gets in beside Wanda and starts the car, her heart still racing. She looks up to find Darcy staring at them, eyes as wide as saucers. Natasha grins at her before she pulls out with a dramatic spin of tires.

It’s quiet between them for a few minutes as they drive away from the motel, but Wanda finally exhales like she’s been holding her breath the whole time, relaxing back against the seat. Natasha reaches over for her hand, linking their fingers together and giving them a squeeze.

“Turn your phone off. Mine’s already off. I don’t want to talk to anyone but you until tomorrow.”

 

“I thought you said you didn’t want to talk to anyone else.” Wanda’s grin is flirty and so fucking cute, and she’s wearing those cut-offs and her red bathing suit top, her feet still a little sandy from the beach. The doors of the balcony are open to the expansive view of the ocean, the salty air rolling through and filling the whole room.

“Well, this is the only way we can get food unless you wanna go out.” Natasha slides up against her back and wraps her arms around her, fingers playing over her bare stomach as she kisses up the side of her neck. “Do you wanna go out?”

“Hm-mm,” Wanda sighs, craning her neck to give Natasha room to kiss even more skin. “Room service is good.”

 

They get giant burgers from room service, Natasha’s beef and Wanda’s a juicy portobello mushroom, and they share a massive plate of fries and three warm brownies, half-watching reruns of _Saved by the Bell_ but mostly taking turns feeding each other fries and licking chocolate from offered fingers. 

“I’m sorry about Simon,” Wanda finally says from her sprawl on their king-size bed, her feet up on the headboard, her head in Natasha’s lap. Natasha is brushing her hair again, combing the sea from it this time, not stopping until she can sift her fingers through all of it without a single snag. Then she goes back in with her fingers just to make Wanda nearly purr. “He’s… well. I’m not going to say that he’s not always like that because you know him, so.”

“Does he talk to you like that a lot?” Natasha watches her face, the way her eyes dance over the ceiling, the crease of worry that appears on her forehead when she talks about Simon.

“Not always,” she replies quietly, like she’s thinking. Her hands are resting on her own bare stomach, fingers playing over the soft skin there. “Just when he gets stressed. Or feels threatened. He kind of has that little man’s syndrome. He’s like a terrier, you know?”

“Perfect description.” Natasha grins, the tips of her fingers stroking along Wanda’s hairline, over her temples and around her ears. Wanda sighs with pleasure, her eyes slipping closed, face smoothing out. 

“I always thought inheritance was about possessions, or features.” Her voice is so soft, Natasha can barely hear it over the constant rush of the waves from outside the open balcony. “Like… my mom’s garnet ring. Or how I have her eyes and her small hands and her wide hips.”

“I love your eyes. And your hands. And your hips.” Natasha runs a hand down her body, stroking over each thing as she goes: delicate skin of her closed eyelids, soft curl of those little hands, the gorgeous curve of Wanda’s hip. Wanda smiles, turning her face to press a kiss to Natasha’s bare, hairy knee.

“My mom had terrible taste in men. Just… really, really horrible. Scam artists, drug dealers, pimps, addicts, you name it. There was always one in the house. Always eyes on me. They made me learn how to be perfectly quiet. And how to sleep light. Thank god for Pietro.”

Natasha wants to say something, to say a lot of things, but she holds it in and keeps her hands on Wanda, warm and constant, and lets her keep talking.

“After she died and we moved to the States, I forgot a lot of it. It took years to come back. Lots of therapy and nightmares. But I remember being fifteen years old and remembering all those men and thinking ‘please god, don’t let me turn out like her.’”

“You haven’t,” Natasha assures her, tucking one long strand of hair behind her ear. 

“But… I am. I really am. I’ve had the worst luck with boyfriends. My boyfriend in high school was twenty-three, and he got arrested in the middle of the night because one of my friends ratted us out. Turns out he had a track record of fucking fifteen year olds. Freshman year of college, I dated a guy named Piper who liked to watch. So I let him talk me into fucking a few of his friends while he sat on the couch and jerked off. Turns out Piper was gay, by the way. But… it still happened.”

“And now Simon,” Natasha continues, mostly to herself, but Wanda nods.

“Simon’s not a bad guy. He’s really not. He’s just selfish a lot. And busy. He was an only child, and he was always a rich kid. He got used to having whatever he wanted exactly when he wanted it. And I’m a constant disappointment, because I’ve never been able to do anything right. We’re just… a bad pair, I guess.”

“He has no right to talk to you the way he does, or treat you like you’re supposed to be an obedient little girl who should only talk when he wants you to.” Natasha somehow manages to stay almost calm while she’s talking, her hands paused in the thickness of Wanda’s hair. “And I promise you, babe, I fuckin’ promise you, you are so far from a disappointment. So fucking far.”

“You’re biased,” Wanda murmurs, reaching up to tug Natasha down to her, staring right up into all of Natasha’s open vulnerability for her, like she’s letting it wash down over her. “You think everything about me is great.”

“It is,” Natasha says against her mouth, kissing her upside down again just like she did the other night. “You are.” She presses one more kiss before lifting up and licking her lips, memorizing the exact smile on Wanda’s face.

“You’re so strong,” Wanda whispers, her eyes wide with wonder while they search hers. Natasha sits up again and shakes her head in denial, about to open her mouth and voice it but Wanda keeps talking. “Like… I remember meeting you, all of you. Just this gang of badass women, right in Simon’s face. But it was you who challenged him. Who looked him right in the eye and made him face his own bullshit. You just… you did that.”

“I was kind of an asshole,” Natasha agrees, smirking down at the girl in her lap while she gathers all of her hair up and drapes it over her own thigh and across the bed. “And… I was to you, too. I never, um.”

She looks away then, every word catching on the back of her teeth.

“I’m sorry for the way I treated you back then. You didn’t deserve that. I was frustrated with Simon, and I took it out on you.”

Wanda doesn’t jump in to dismiss it, or to deny it. She blinks a few times, her eyes shining brighter with what looks painfully like held-in tears as she searches the ceiling above Natasha’s head. She reaches for one of Natasha’s hands, lacing their fingers together and holding on tight.

“Thank you,” she finally says, the words uneven, soft.

“I’ve… I’ve never been good at dealing with my own shit. Ever. You can ask Steve. And Bucky. And Darcy. I promise I know when I make mistakes. Faster than anybody else. It’s just… it’s just hard for me to.” Her throat closes up tight, too tight to swallow. She tenses her jaw and probably squeezes Wanda’s hand too hard. 

“I get it,” Wanda promises, running her thumb over Natasha’s palm to draw her attention back down to her. Natasha has to climb out of her own head to do it, but she meets Wanda’s eyes and feels immediately calmer. She swallows thickly and gives her a flash of a smile.

“So, see. I’m not as strong as you think. I just play a badass on TV.”

“You’re strong to me. You’re my hero. You make me feel stronger.” Wanda’s face is focused and serious as she searches Natasha’s eyes. “I don’t think you understand how big of a deal that is for me. I’ve felt invisible ever since I moved and started school.”

“See, that’s where you’re wrong. I see you. I saw you right from the beginning. I’ve been watching you the whole time. Wanted you from the first fucking second.” She tugs on Wanda’s hand, trying to get her into a position where she can kiss her properly, her eyes zeroed in on those soft lips that curve into a smile as Wanda sits up and settles in cross-legged right in front of Natasha, their knees touching. When they kiss it’s soft and young and sweet, like a scene from _My Girl_ , no sounds in the world except waves crashing soft and eternal nearby and the mouths of two girls falling in love speaking in a quiet language of skin and saliva and kisses that speak of all the pain that led them both up to being here now, together. And how maybe it was worth it.

“I want to know your family,” Wanda whispers as they hold hands again, four palms finding their mirrors. “All those boys you live with. I want to hang out with them.”

“They’ll love you. And they’ll try to steal you from me just so they can protect you and feed you five-alarm chili and turn you into a wrestling fan.” Natasha grins at the sound of Wanda’s laughter. It’s the best sound in the world.

“Where did you meet them all anyway?”

“Pretty hilarious story, actually.” She lets go of one of Wanda’s hands to reach over for the bottle of water on the nightstand, taking a drink from it before passing it to Wanda. “So Steve and me and Bucky, well. You know that story, more or less.”

“More or less,” Wanda agrees, though her tone implies that she wants to know more than less.

“So, the three of us lived together. It was… god. It was kind of a dark time, really. Steve was still in nursing school, and he had a job on top of that. I worked at this place with a boss who liked to feel me up and I had to fucking let him because… well, nevermind. And Bucky.” She shakes her head, refusing to go back there, refusing to think about it again. “Anyway. We were struggling. But one night, we decided to go have a drink at this bar just to get out of the house for awhile. And it turned out it was music trivia night. And I’m a total punk goddess, _obviously_ \--”

“Obviously.” Wanda beams at her, leaning forward to press a pop kiss to her mouth.

“--And Steve loves old fifties rock’n’roll and rockabilly. And Bucky’s a total 90s grunge kid. So, we thought, why not? Let’s try. So we made up a little team and joined in and started to play. And there were three other groups that kept matching us on points, to the fuckin’ point that it ended in a tie for all of us. So, we started talking to the other groups, and a bunch of us decided we would be better as a supergroup. Like the Transplants, yanno?”

“No,” Wanda replies, shaking her head with a mischievous smile.

“Like… like Cream. Is that better?”

“Yep!” Wanda grins at her, capping the water and leaning over to put it back on the nightstand.

“So, we got together and formed a music trivia supergroup. We called ourselves The Avengers. And we fuckin’ slayed every week. Everybody in the group had their speciality. Nobody could beat us. It was amazing. And Tony had just bought this huge brownstone in Brooklyn because he likes having a project to work on, and one night we got really drunk after trivia and he invited us to all come live there. So… we did.”

“That’s… incredible.” Wanda leans back against the headboard and pulls her legs up, wrapping her arms around them as she shakes her head with an amazed smile. “And now you’re a family.”

“We are.” It used to be hard for Natasha to say, or even admit to herself, but it’s true. She has a family now. “Which brings me to a question: what can you add to the group? What’s your musical specialty? Because I know it’s not punk.”

“You caught me.” Wanda gives a dramatic sigh, resting her head back against the wood of the headboard and staring at Natasha from beneath her lashes. “My secret is out.”

“Tell me.” Natasha squirms forward to sit close to Wanda, leaning down to press kisses across her knees and up her chest to her mouth, grinning against her lips while Wanda kisses her back. “What do you listen to?”

“I can show you?” Wanda rubs her nose against Natasha’s before slipping off of the bed. Natasha sprawls out across the expanse of the mattress and watches her move around the room, not realizing at all how soft her expression is. Wanda comes back with her phone and a dock with a speaker on it, and she plugs it all in and gets it set up and slides her phone on it. A soft brush of guitar strums comes trickling out a few seconds later. Wanda climbs up onto the bed again and tucks in against Natasha, curling in on herself until Natasha big-spoons up behind her on the same pillow.

A whisper of a female voice comes out then like she’s telling secrets or the history of the universe; poetry over fragile guitar. That song bleeds into a soft, starry indie pop song with another girl singing, and then into another, and another. Natasha holds her the whole time, breathes quietly, and listens to every word. She presses a line of kisses from the nape of Wanda’s neck down the delicate line of her spine, as far as her mouth can reach.

“So… sad girls with guitars?” she says quietly, smiling against her skin.

Wanda tenses up just a little in her arms, and she stays quiet for a few beats before shrugging.

“Yeah. I guess.”

Natasha tugs on her as she moves to sit up a little. Wanda stares up at her where Natasha is leaning over her now, and Natasha can see the hesitancy there, can see how Wanda is braced to be teased.

“I love it,” she tells her, quiet and honest. Wanda opens up like a flower then, all the tension leaving her body as her tight mouth curves into a grin. She reaches up and wraps her arms around Natasha’s neck, tugging her down for a kiss that lets Natasha lick into her mouth, lets her taste the way Wanda is laid open for her right now, so sweetly bare. 

Another song comes on, one that Natasha knows. 

“Dance with me,” Wanda whispers against her lips. “Please?”

Natasha climbs for the bed and reaches for Wanda, tugging her up and against her own body; their breasts nestled against each other, foreheads resting together. Natasha wraps her arms around Wanda’s waist, pulling her in close while Wanda does the same with her arms draped around Natasha’s neck.

“Are you trying to Mazzy Star me? Is this how dreampop girls make you fall for them?” Natasha watches Wanda’s closed eyes, feels her warm breath on her face, the gentle, secret moves of her body against her own. Nothing has ever felt like this. Nothing at all.

“Is it working?” Wanda murmurs against her lips. Her hands slide up to cup the back of Natasha’s head just as Natasha slips one hand down into the pocket of Wanda’s shorts, the other pressing to the center of her back, cradling her. Both of them moving to make the other one feel held safe. 

Natasha doesn’t have words anymore. She just nods and lets her own eyes close finally, ignoring the blaze of colors as the sun sets outside for the sanctuary they’ve created between their own bodies. 

Somewhere in the blur of watercolor songs, they start kissing. The inside of Wanda’s mouth is just as soft as the inside of her sweet, pink cunt, and Natasha can’t help but devour it just the same way, but lick into her just as hungry and possessive as she had in that dingy bathroom at the club in Baltimore. 

Wanda gasps against her lips, just a soft pull of sound. Natasha has backed her up to the bed, trapped her there without even realizing it.

“I got us something,” she tells her, voice low with her hunger for this. “Picked out a fat, juicy dick to strap on. Even got some kind of fancy, organic lube that taste like roses. You gonna let me fuck this tight ass of yours?” 

The sound that leaves Wanda’s mouth is so hungry it surprises them both. She sinks down onto the bed, eye level with Natasha’s crotch, her mouth bright pink from being kissed. 

“Please let me see you first,” she says softly, her hands coming up to rest on Natasha’s hips, pushing at her wifebeater to get to her bare stomach. “Let me make you feel good, too.”

Natasha can’t deny her, not in this. She steps back from her just enough to not feel self-conscious that Wanda is seeing too much too soon. She pulls the tanktop over her head, leaving her in a sports bra and her little boardshorts and absolutely shy in the face of Wanda’s eagerness.

She lowers her gaze to her own body as she works her way out of the sports bra, no sexy way to do it but to mush and struggle and grunt until it’s over her head and off. Her breasts are full and soft and undeniably feminine, absolutely beautiful but something she’s only partially comfortable with half the time. She lowers her arms and lets Wanda look at her as much as she wants, not even bothering to try and hide the way she’s blushing from the attention.

“Can I?” Wanda moves closer to the edge of the bed, her eyes completely focused on Natasha’s breasts but she manages to glance up into her eyes for permission. Natasha steps forward again as a response, standing between Wanda’s spread legs, her head still down so she can see perfectly when Wanda’s hands come up to cup her breasts, fingers sinking in to squeeze them slow, gentle.

Natasha bites down on her bottom lip while a shiver drives up her spine, her nipples hardening between Wanda’s fingers. She sucks in a breath when those nimble fingers come together around her nipples, circling and stroking and drawing together to pluck at them, her breasts bouncing every so slightly with each tug. When Wanda pinches them, Natasha swallows, no longer able to hide the way it’s affecting her. 

She busies herself with stroking Wanda’s hair back from her face, staring at the thick fall of Wanda’s eyelashes, marveling at how their eyes are exactly the same shade of green, meant to see each other.

Wanda ducks forward and draws one of Natasha’s breasts into her mouth, sucking her nipple into tight warmth, letting her teeth dig in ever so slightly.

“Oh, shit,” Natasha whispers, fingers tightening in Wanda’s hair, her face burning now. Wanda suckles like she’s drinking, everything about her relaxed and tuned into what she’s doing. Natasha cradles her there, closes her eyes, and lets her.

Wanda pulls off after a long moment, her mouth just as puffy and swollen and wet as Natasha’s nipple, her pupils blown and unfocused as she seeks out the other breast, blind and hungry as a child. She latches on with a deep, curling moan of contentment, and it makes something lurch inside of Natasha, makes her pussy throb, soaking the inside of her boardshorts. She reaches down and unties Wanda’s bikini top, tugging it off so that her tits are bare now, too, so she has something to stare at and touch and worship while Wanda all but nurses at her.

“You’re gonna make me come,” she warns her in a low voice, squeezing Wanda’s left breast, kneading it firmly while Wanda gnaws and mouths at her now raw nipple.

Wanda reaches for her, drawing Natasha down to sit on her thigh. Natasha sinks down with a relieved sigh, grinding her cunt against Wanda’s smooth leg through her shorts just as Wanda renews her sucking, making it harder, hungrier. Natasha abandons all pretense of doing anything but chasing her orgasm, her arms wrapping around Wanda’s neck, keeping that mouth right where it is while she rides her thigh, her clit caught in the perfect place to get almost painful friction.

It’s the movement of her hips, that familiar, comforting feeling of fucking something that allows her to come, her sob buried in the sea-scented top of Wanda’s head, her body a tight, shaking curl on top of Wanda. She floods her shorts as she humps desperately at her thigh, her nipple shivering and hot in Wanda’s beautiful mouth.

“God, I wanna taste it,” Wanda gasps as she breaks away from Natasha’s breasts, grabbing Natasha’s shaking body by the hips and throwing her onto the bed. Natasha goes, arching up as she rides the last edges of her orgasm, wanton and letting Wanda strip her shorts off and push her thighs apart.

“Wait, wait,” Natasha gasps, fingers sinking into Wanda’s hair to keep her where she is, hovering over her throbbing cunt that is fucking _starved_ for Wanda’s mouth. “There’s… let me…”

She takes a deep breath to try and find words in her hazy mind.

“I don’t… I don’t like things in me. It’s… that’s really hard for me. I barely even…” She licks her lips, her eyes closed, refusing to look at Wanda while she confesses this. “So… so you can touch me, just. Just don’t--”

“I’ve got you.” Wanda lowers her head in Natasha’s softening grip and kisses along the unshaven inside of Natasha’s thigh while her hands move to spread her legs wider. Natasha allows it only because they’re alone and she’s safe and this is Wanda. “I understand. Show me. Show me what to do.”

She nods, releasing Wanda so she can drop down to her stomach between Natasha’s splayed legs. Natasha slides a hand down her own body and over her cunt that is sloppy wet and hot, letting her fingers rub at her outer lips to massage there, rubbing in some of the come.

She pulls her lips back, using her forefinger to tug back the hood from her already stiff clit, exposing it for Wanda’s eyes. She’s flushed all the way down to her tits. 

“Treat it like a cock,” she whispers.

Wanda’s tongue slides into the folds of her pussy, following the exact path her own fingers had just a few seconds ago. Natasha sighs, relaxing back against the bed, one of her legs coming up to bend at the knee on the bed. She lifts her arms over her head and holds onto the pillow, not hiding her hairy pits, not hiding any fucking thing about herself right now. It’s so good, it doesn’t feel real.

Wanda’s fingers come up to circle her clit, her other hand pushing the hood up hard to get to the full length of it. Natasha groans when she feels Wanda’s tongue there, flicking at the tip, lapping at it until it’s so good it hurts, it burns all through her, driving her legs even further apart. 

“Jack me off,” she whispers.

She licks her lips when Wanda spits on her cunt, when she feels it slide slow between the folds of it. Wanda catches her clit between her fore and middle fingers, holding it tight against the V between them as she starts to rub her hand there, jacking Natasha off so fucking perfectly that she can barely breathe.

Genius. Wanda is a fucking genius.

“Good girl,” Natasha gasps, arching up off the bed, grinding down against her hand. “That’s it, babe. God, that’s it.”

Wanda sucks Natasha’s clit into her mouth even as she jacks off the base of it between her fingers, her whole hand rubbing at Natasha’s cunt while she gives her the most delicious suction. One of her hands steal down and holds onto the back of Wanda’s head, keeping her where she is, not even able to say another fucking word before she’s coming like a nuclear explosion, soaking Wanda’s entire hand as her clit throbs in her mouth.

Wanda holds onto her like the best girl ever, brings her down but keeps up with the motions, licking Natasha’s clit and rubbing her hand deep against her pussy, easing out the ache and drawing out her climaxes until Natasha is boneless on the bed, so relaxed she can’t move.

“Mm,” she manages deliriously when Wanda starts to lick her clean, being so careful not to penetrate as she does. Her cunt is sated and slick with spit when Wanda leaves it, and Natasha finally has enough of her brain back to haul Wanda in and kiss her hard, licking into her mouth and groaning at the taste.

“Love how my pussy tastes in your mouth,” she whispers, keeping a hold on Wanda and lifting up to flip them over on the bed. She tugs Wanda’s cut-offs down, leaving her in that tiny bikini bottom that she’s more than a little in love with.

“Do you understand how fucking hot you look in those? How I can see your cunt in them?” She tugs up on the waist of them until they’re tight on Wanda’s cunt, showing off her plump little pussylips just above the dark wet spot. Wanda moans, writhing on the bed, feet pressed to the mattress as she lifts her hips. Natasha sits up a little so she can watch the show, pulling on the fabric until she can catch the seam of it against Wanda’s clit.

She moves up Wanda’s body and kisses up her neck, pressing her mouth against her ear.

“I bet I can make you come just like this,” she murmurs, moving the fabric back and forth, letting the seam rub over Wanda’s clit over and over again. “Do you think you can?”

Wanda nods, her eyebrows drawn together in concentration, bottom lip caught between her teeth. Natasha keeps at it, ducking her head to kiss Wanda’s throat, biting and sucking on her neck while Wanda whines and tries to push down on the bikini bottoms, trying to get more friction but it’s just enough, just a inelegant rub against the very tip of her clit.

“Please,” she sobs finally, the top half of her body turning so she can wrap her arms around Natasha’s neck and kiss at her face, panting against her cheek. “Pl-Please, Nat.”

Natasha stays quiet, just lets it build and build until her hand hurts and Wanda is burning hot all over, trembling as she clutches at Natasha, no sound in the room but the kisses Natasha digs into Wanda’s neck and the whisper of bedsheets as Wanda writhes and her desperate, breathless panting. 

When she comes it’s like a tidal wave, it seems to start at her curled toes and work all the way up her body, coming from so deep that she doesn’t make a sound for the longest moment, just shakes against Natasha, her breath held until she can’t anymore. It explodes out of her in a series of deafening, painful sobs right against Natasha’s ear, her whole body shaking so hard that it’s almost frightening. 

Natasha flips her over right in the middle of them, drags Wanda up onto her knees and admires the heart shape of her ass in that magical bikini before she rips it off of her. Her pussylips are fat and glistening between her pressed thighs, and Natasha gets her hands on that fat ass while she buries her face there, licking into the tight trap of her cunt. She sucks on her pussy while Wanda continues to come, paying special attention to her clit until Wanda comes again from the focus alone.

She moves up to her ass then, spreading her cheeks apart and staring down at the perfect, seemingly virginal tightness of her asshole that is contracting with her pussy. She gathers saliva in her mouth and spits it out, watching as it slides slowly down her taint. She dives in, licking her asshole with just as much hunger as she did to her cunt.

“Ohmygod.” Wanda’s legs spread then, knees sliding across the mattress, her back arching to shove her ass up. Natasha rubs her thumb over that pretty pink hole, massaging in her spit and softening it up before she pushes the tip of it inside. She works the rest of it in, amazed at how hungry it is, how Wanda just swallows it up. She fucks her with it, driving her thumb into her unbelievably tight ass, wondering vaguely how she ever thought she’d get that fat dildo she’d bought inside of it.

“This what you want?” She kisses at Wanda’s ass, sinking her teeth into the softness of it, leaving sucked-out bitemarks in her wake. “Want this pretty ass fucked?”

Wanda nods where her face is buried into the pillow, goosebumps covering every inch of skin Natasha can see. She pulls her thumb out and sits up, bringing her hand down in a rough slap on Wanda’s ass before she climbs off the bed.

She unzips the bag she’d brought, pulling out the boybrief harness she’d bought earlier, the dick already attached and ready. She slides them up her thighs and makes sure they’re as snug as they can be, that the straps are tight and secure. She grabs the new bottle of lube and walks back over to the bed where Wanda is waiting, her cheeks tear-stained and flushed, her eyes wide.

“God, that’s huge.”

They both look down at the admittedly massive cock jutting out from Natasha’s crotch, swaying and veiny and ready to fuck. Exactly the dick Natasha has in her dreams.

She grips the base of it and runs her hand up the length, rubbing her thumb over the imaginary slit as she stares at Wanda there on the bed, naked and flushed, pupils blown as she stares at Natasha’s cock.

“You can take it,” she assures her as she walks up to her, the dick so close to Wanda’s mouth now that Natasha can swear she feels it. “Look, I got organic lube and everything. Tastes like roses.”

She uncaps the lube and squeezes some out on her fingers, smearing it around until they’re soaked. She looks down at Wanda, their eyes meeting.

“Get up on the bed, on your knees. Get that fat ass up for me.”

Wanda’s face flushes an even deeper shade of pink, her lashes growing heavy as she stares up at Natasha through them. 

“Yes, ma’am,” she whispers.

She crawls up the bed, showing off her pretty ass and already creamy pussy as she does. She drops down to her elbows, her ass up and on display. Ready. Her knees are spread wide, her hole already a little loose, like it knows what’s coming.

Natasha follows her, her cock nudging between Wanda’s thighs as she rubs between her cheeks with her slicked-up fingers, going from her tailbone all the way down to her clit, bringing sticky-sweet come back with her as she massages Wanda’s asshole. 

She sinks her middle finger in first, giving her the whole thing and watching her react to it, her body lifting and curling and begging immediately.

“I don’t have to go slow for you, do I? Hmm? Looks like you’ve already had somebody in this ass before. Have you?”

Wanda nods almost dreamily while Natasha goes back in with her ring finger added, pushing down and in, nudging at her vaginal walls and making her pussy move with the motion. She keeps at it, drawing almost hurt-sounding moans from Wanda.

“A bunch of times. Old b-boyfriends. But not for a long time. Not… not for years. Need it,” she mumbles. Natasha forces her forefinger in, three fingers now. She digs at her insides, rubbing her impossible tightness out and leaving her a little softer, a little looser. 

“Gonna fuck you until you’re sore. Gonna gape this ass just like a cunt. I’m gonna fuck you better than any guy could. You know I will, don’t you?” She slicks up her cock with her left hand, squeezing some more of the lube straight into Wanda’s ass where her fingers are pulling down, holding her open.

“Yes,” Wanda whines, not even sounding like herself now. She’s trembling all over, working back against Natasha’s hand, already so relaxed. “Fuck me. Fuck my ass, Nat. God, I need it. Need it so bad.”

Natasha grips her cock and lines herself up, her fingers slippery with lube when she presses the tip in. She shakes it there, slapping at the inside of Wanda’s rim with the head of her cock, making Wanda’s cries pitch even lower, more pleading. She grabs Wanda’s hip, the meat of her ass, to hold on, grits her teeth, and pushes in.

Wanda is so tight that Natasha swears she can feel it, she can fucking feel it around this lucky, silicone dick pushing into Wanda’s ass. She lets go of it once she gets the head in and holds onto Wanda’s hips with both hands, pulling her back even as she digs her hips forward, making her take it slowly, a little at a time.

“Push out,” she tells her quietly after she’s about halfway in, the rest of it stuck outside, Wanda just too fucking tight to get any more in. “Push out around my dick.”

Wanda obeys, a squelch of lube bubbling out as she whimpers. Natasha slides in a little deeper, nestling deep into Wanda’s guts that are gripping her so hard it would probably hurt if it really was Natasha’s dick. 

Natasha runs her hands up Wanda’s back, running her nails gently back down her spine and over the soft curves of her ass. She reaches down between Wanda’s legs and rubs over her pussy, getting two fingers on her clit and rubbing it firmly while she starts to thrust into her ass with short, shallow movements.

“Good girl,” she groans as Wanda cries out, her hips stuttering as she struggles to rock down against Natasha’s hand and back on her dick. “Feel so fuckin’ good on my dick, doll. Tight ass grippin’ me so good.”

“Fuck me,” Wanda pants, her hand joining Natasha’s between her legs, her own fingers pushing into her pussy while Natasha rubs her clit. “Fuck me deep, _fuck me_.”

Natasha lifts back, centering herself as she spreads her knees, hands sinking into Wanda’s hips again, the fingers of her left hand leaving trail of pussy slick on her skin. She leans back, using the grip on Wanda’s hips to keep her upright as she lets go, thrusting firmly into Wanda’s asshole, working her open as steadily as she can, trying to get even deeper, to go until Wanda’s rim is stretched around the base of her dick.

When she finally does, Wanda is sobbing, sucking in lungfuls of air and shaking under Natasha’s hands, on her cock that is buried completely in her ass now, Wanda’s wet cunt pressed right against the front of Natasha’s briefs. 

“That’s nine inches,” Natasha tells her with a hard shove of her hips, driving in just a little deeper to hear Wanda scream. “Nine fucking inches that ass just swallowed up. Does it hurt? Can you feel it in your fucking stomach?”

She reaches around to rub the softness of Wanda’s stomach while she cries, squeezing at her tiny, soft belly before she lets that same hand rub at her tits. Wanda nods, her own hand working furiously at her pussy and she comes just like that, all over her own hand and Natasha’s dick, her body shuddering as she tries to ride back against it.

Natasha drapes over her, shoving Wanda’s legs together and straddling her body to get in that much deeper, to get better leverage just like she’s seen Steve to do to Bucky before she just lets go, her tits pressed tight to Wanda’s back while she fucks into her brutally hard.

“This is mine,” she growls against Wanda’s ear while she pounds into her ass, stretching her open wide on a cock as wide as her own forearm. She gathers Wanda’s wrists in one hand and drags them up to hold them against the headboard, her other hand forced under Wanda’s hips to get at her pussy again. “This is, too. _Mine_. I’m the only one who knows how to take you apart.”

“ _Yes_ ,” Wanda sobs, stretched out and completely submissive under her, her ass jiggling hard while Natasha tears into her, the dirty, sucking pulls of her ass loud in the room. Natasha kisses across her shoulders and up the back of her neck, her belly nestled into the small of Wanda’s back where sweat has pooled up. “K-Keep going, gonna make me come. Gonna make me come, Nat, gonna make me fuckin’ come.”

Wanda is completely gone now, the sounds she’s making completely foreign, entirely different than she sounds when she’s getting her pussy fucked. She sounds wild now, feral, almost growling as she takes Natasha’s dick in her ass, as she rocks back against it as best as she can.

Natasha just hangs on, bears down and packs it in as fast and hard as she can, her fingers bumping clumsily over Wanda’s clit as the other one holds Wanda’s wrist together hard enough to bruise on the headboard. 

She feels it when Wanda comes, feels it all over her, feels it like Wanda is gripping her cock with that gorgeous ass as she shakes apart on it; she feels it and she comes right along with her, the base of the toy digging hard against her own clit. She slops in and out of her now loose asshole, lube still oozing out of it, moving on top of her until Wanda is still and gasping beneath her. Natasha can feel her heartbeat against her fingers where they’re buried in Wanda’s pussy, thumb against her pulsing clit.

Natasha lavishes her with kisses, licking up sweat along the back of her neck and blowing cool air over her heated skin. She kisses over her cheek, lips growing softer against Wanda’s temple as they both come down, melting into each other. 

Natasha lifts up after a long, languid moment, starts to pull out, but Wanda stirs then, wrestles out of Natasha’s grip on her wrists and reaches back to grab Natasha’s thigh, pulling on it to still her.

“Stay in,” Wanda whispers, her voice strained, wrecked. “Just for a little while.”

Natasha smiles against her skin, dropping one more kiss there before she grabs hold of Wanda’s hips, turning them carefully onto their sides, making sure she stays nestled inside of her as she does. It’s dusk outside now, the muted blues and purples of twilight giving way to the night, stars spreading bright through the sky over the ocean outside. A cool breeze drifts in through the open door, sliding right over their sweaty, locked bodies.

Natasha kisses along the curve of Wanda’s jaw, leg draped over the lovely curve of her thigh, her fingers stroking over Wanda’s body, exploring lazily, tracing and adoring every inch of skin she can find while Wanda softens against her, falling asleep under the touches.

There are words on the tip of Natasha’s tongue that terrify her, ones that almost make her stop, get up from the bed and run, leave this room and this girl behind, escape completely what she is making her feel.

She stays, fighting every single instinct life has forced into her, tucks her face into the pillow and breathing in the sweaty, clean smell of the ocean in Wanda’s hair. 

_I’m not in love, it’s okay,_ she tells herself as her eyes slip closed, her arm wrapped protectively around Wanda’s waist, hand splayed on her stomach. _I’m not in love._


	8. this side of the blue

“Say goodbye.”

Wanda pouts up at her, her eyes massive and liquid and pleading.

“Do I have to?”

“Yes,” Natasha says patiently. “We’ve gotta go. C’mon.”

Wanda sighs, taking a few steps closer until she’s standing in front of Natasha. She turns her gaze to the dildo Natasha’s holding, cupping her hands around Natasha’s to bring it close to her face.

“Bye, Monster. I had a great time last night,” Wanda tells the toy, running her delicate fingers over the fat, veiny girth of it.

“And this morning,” Natasha reminds her.

“Mm. Yes. And this morning.” She presses a kiss to the tip of the fake cock, her eyes lifting to Natasha’s again as she wraps her lips around it, giving it a slow, dirty little suck while they watch each other.

Natasha bites her bottom lip, tipping the toy to one side and pushing it a little further into Wanda’s mouth. Wanda moans, her eyes falling closed, hands tightening on Natasha’s. 

“You’re tryin’ to kill me.” Natasha pulls the toy away from her and grabs her by the hair, dragging her in for a devouring kiss that gets Natasha’s tongue as deep inside of Wanda’s mouth as she can. They break apart panting, staring intensely at each other while Natasha keeps her grip on the hair at the back of Wanda’s head. 

“We’ve gotta go,” she whispers against Wanda’s mouth, pressing a softer, much sweeter kiss there. “C’mon, beautiful.”

 

They pile into the elevator with their bags next to a man and a woman who are clearly together but aren’t saying a word to each other. Natasha looks over and meets Wanda’s eyes, both of them smiling in a bashful sort of way that has them glancing away after only a few seconds. She wraps her arm around Wanda’s waist, tugging her closer and pressing a kiss to her jaw.

“How you feelin’?” she murmurs as she drops a kiss behind Wanda’s ear. The man and woman are even more quiet now, in a way that means they’re aware of Nat and Wanda and they’re listening.

Good. Let them.

“Good,” Wanda replies, turning toward Natasha a little, letting her nose nuzzle along Natasha’s cheek like a cat. “Sore, but good.”

“You need to take it easy today, you hear me? If you need anything, tell me. I’ll take care of it.” She tucks Wanda’s hair behind her ear while she nods, their eyes meeting briefly before they kiss, gentle and almost chaste. The woman next to her is fuming.

The doors open up to the lobby, and Natasha tugs Wanda along, her arm still around her waist and a smirk on her face.

Pissing off homophobes never stops being fun.

 

“Finally,” Simon snips, thrusting a notebook into Wanda’s hands and glaring at her from behind his sunglasses. “Go take a quick inventory of our equipment. There’s a bag of cords missing and we can’t find it anywhere. I think you left it in Baltimore.”

“Uh, pretty sure that was _our_ fault, not Wanda’s,” Kamala says as she walks by, looking frazzled and sweaty and annoyed. Natasha raises her eyebrows at her but doesn’t get anything in response.

“I’ll go do it real quick, it’s fine,” Wanda tells them all, pulling the pen out of the spiral of the notebook and opening it up. “Is everything else okay?”

“Like you fucking care. Hurry up.” Simon walks away then, shouldering past Natasha on his way out. 

“Good to see you, too, sunshine!” She waves at Simon’s back, turning to look at Wanda so they can share their exasperation, but Wanda is already hurrying away, notebook clutched to her chest, her face smeared with too many emotions to try and read at a glance.

Guilt. The main one Natasha saw there was guilt.

“Fuck,” she breathes, pushing her hands up into her messy hair and tugging on it. Anxiety spreads through her chest and drops down hard into her stomach. She reaches into her pocket for her phone on instinct but she leaves it there, not really wanting to drag Steve or Bucky into her current shit.

Especially Steve.

She digs the pick out of her pocket instead and sets off in search of her band.

 

“Right there! Fuck, right there right there. Fuck me, Nat. God, fuck me good.” Wanda is sprawled on her side, one leg lifted high and pressed along Natasha’s sweaty chest, splayed wide open so Natasha can straddle her other thigh and shove their cunts together as tight as possible.

She’s fucking her with abandon, their clits lodged together as they grind desperately, pussies slick and squelching with every thrust. She hums around Wanda’s toes that she’s sucking on almost contentedly, her eyes heavy with pleasure as she drips sweat, her third orgasm very quickly approaching.

She reaches down for the toy lodged in Wanda’s ass and grips the base, fucking her with it just to hear her scream, to force Wanda to come, to gush out against her own cunt, slick dripping down Wanda’s flushed, pale thigh.

Natasha collapses down on her after she comes down, her whole body practically numb with pleasure. She rolls off and to Wanda’s side, both of them staring up at the ceiling, breathing hard, bodies trembling with aftershocks.

“Told you tribbing was good,” she manages after a long moment, grinning when Wanda exhales an exhausted laugh. She hears more than sees Wanda pull the dildo out of her ass and toss it on the nightstand, and she grins when Wanda leans over her, all that long, sweaty hair surrounding them both when Wanda kisses her, sated and tender and savoring.

It calms Natasha a little, relieves some of the anxiety from the tense show last night and the quiet drive back to the motel afterwards. Simon had left first thing this morning, said he was going to spend the day on a boat with a friend and didn’t invite anyone, even Wanda along.

Natasha had taken immediate advantage of it.

“I bet your pretty little ass is sore, isn’t it?” Natasha mumbles, reaching down to run her fingers over Wanda’s loose, swollen asshole, drawing a hiss out of her that ends in a deep shudder.

“Feels so good,” Wanda whispers after a kiss, rocking back against Natasha’s gently rubbing fingers, leaving soft little hurt sounds against Natasha’s mouth. She whimpers when Natasha pushes a finger in, rubbing around at her puffy insides just to draw out more noises from her.

Thunder rumbles outside, low and distant. The rain started about an hour ago and hasn’t let up since.

Wanda sprawls back on the bed and reaches for Natasha, and she goes willingly, of course, nestling her cheek down into the soft, flushed pillows of Wanda’s breasts, breathing in the salt of her skin and the pale scent of soap.

She’d just fucked Wanda in the bed she shares with Simon.

The quiet stretches out between them, comfortable at first but Natasha shifts, just a tiny movement, but it gives the silence an edge. Wanda tenses under her, hands stilling on Natasha’s back.

Natasha stares straight ahead at the curve of Wanda’s tit, at the bitemarks she’d put all over the surface, at the deep pink of her hard nipple still puffy from Natasha’s mouth.

“When are you going to break up with him?” she says, her voice quiet but clear. Wanda doesn’t react, but her heartbeat speeds up under Natasha’s ear, her whole body tensing up even more. Her hand drops away from Natasha’s spine.

Natasha closes her eyes like she’s waiting for a bullet.

“I don’t know,” Wanda replies softly.

Natasha lifts up then, careful not to look down at her. She digs around on the floor for her jeans and t-shirt, pulling them both on while Wanda watches wordlessly from the bed.

“Gonna go smoke,” she mumbles as she opens the door, fishing her cigarettes out of her pocket as she steps out into the grey early afternoon.

She leans back against the faded pink stucco and takes a long pull from her cigarette, exhaling on a sigh as she pulls her phone out.

_i am the world’s biggest fuck up._

She stares at the screen, hoping for an instantaneous reply. Relief floods through her when she sees the bubble that tells her Bucky is typing up a reply.

_just want you to remember that you’re talking to a guy who can barely leave the house for weeks at a time._

Natasha nearly smiles, but the truth of it hurts too much. She inhales from the cigarette dangling from her lips, pretending that the tears burning in her eyes are from the smoke.

_what would you do if instead of knowing steve your whole life, you just met him and he was with somebody else?_

She stares at her phone after she sends, waiting for Bucky’s reply for a long moment. She gets nearly the entire cigarette smoked before the typing bubble comes up, and she feels horrible when she realizes what she’s just made Bucky think about.

_wouldn’t be alive without him. wouldn’t have made it long enough to find him._

Bucky keeps typing and deleting, typing and deleting. Natasha ignores the tear that slips down her face.

_i’m sorry, nat. i’m sorry you’ve finally found somebody and you can’t have her._

“Me, too,” Natasha says out loud, hating how fragile her voice sounds. She sighs, tucking her phone back into her pocket and shuffling over to the door again.

The room is clean now, the dildo put away, bed made, clothes off the floor. The smell of sex is strong in the air, unmistakable, and Natasha can’t help that she takes a deep breath to savor it.

The shower is running, light flooding the otherwise dark bedroom from the open bathroom door. The invitation is clear, and Natasha has no pride left.

She strips down again, pausing with her hand on the shower curtain for a few beats before she tugs it back, revealing Wanda naked and pink under the steaming hot showerhead. Her eyes are glittering and wet, everything about her vulnerable, too exposed for Natasha to bear.

She steps into the shower, holding Wanda’s gaze as approaches her. She slides her arms around Wanda’s waist and pulls her in close, relieved when Wanda wraps her arms around her neck, practically clinging to her.

“I don’t know what to do,” Wanda says against Natasha’s cheek, her voice shivering, muffled by the water. “I just don’t know what to do.”

The _why_ is caught in Natasha’s throat, all the questions about why Wanda is with Simon in the first place, what he gives her that keeps her around, if she’s in love with him, staying within her because she doesn’t want to know, not really. She doesn’t want the truth unless it won’t hurt.

She kisses at Wanda’s cheek, down her jaw, soft at first but it gets more frantic with each press of her lips. Wanda is crying softly against her ear, her breath quickening when Natasha’s hands slide down to her ass, gripping soft, warm handfuls of it and kneading it almost roughly.

“Turn around,” Natasha breathes against her jaw.

She doesn’t give her time to react, doesn’t give herself time to question her own desperation, just spins her around and shoves her against the tiled wall, dropping to her knees in the tight confines of the shower, right under the spray of hot water.

She spreads Wanda’s ass and stares at her hole, puffy and red and soft from being fucked. She licks her lips, closes her eyes, and dives in.

“Oh, shit,” Wanda sobs, tipping her ass up to get at Natasha’s mouth, trembling as Natasha licks and kisses at her tender asshole. Natasha tongues down over her taint and the back of her slit where Wanda’s fingers are already dug in, fingering her still creamy pussy while Natasha eats her ass.

She kisses at those fingers, flicking her tongue over them before kissing back up to her hole, going back in with renewed hunger, her hands digging in hard on Wanda’s ass, holding it wide open so she can get in as deep as possible.

“I knew it.”

The words are random, like the sound of an alarm clock in the middle of a dream. Out of place and slightly hysterical, thin and accusatory and distinctly male. 

Cold air rushes up Natasha’s back from where the shower curtain is drawn, where Simon is standing now, staring in at them, seeing it all, seeing every fucking thing and there is no way to deny any of it, no explanation to give. 

Natasha lets go of Wanda, feeling like she’s still in a dream, her hands falling to her own thighs as she turns and stares straight up into his furious face, into his bright blue eyes that are glistening with tears.

“ _I knew it_!” he screams, slamming the heel of his hand into the wall by the shower. He’s gone then, pulling the door closed behind him so hard that the whole frame rattles. 

Natasha can’t move, can’t do anything but stare stupidly after him, her mouth open.

“Simon!”

Wanda jostles her as she pushes past her to climb out of the shower, the curtain pushed back entirely now. Natasha watches Wanda grab a towel and wrap it around her body before she opens the door and chases after her boyfriend.

She stands up in a daze, shutting the water off with a violently shaking hand and walking across the slick tile, dripping water all over the floor. She stops at the sink, at the steamed-up mirror where she can make out the vague shape of herself, the colors and blurred lines of her body, the shock of her red hair. She can’t see the blank, frightened look on her face, the bright green of her red-rimmed eyes, the steady lines of tears down her cheeks.

She pulls her clothes on again without drying off, zipping her jeans but not buttoning them, her hair dripping wet down her temple and the back of her neck.

The room is empty when she wanders into it, Simon’s bag tossed by the door. It’s raining still, dripping from the gutters along the awning in front of the window.

 _Of course he’s not on the boat,_ her mind supplies vaguely. _It’s raining._

She opens the door and steps outside, assaulted immediately with the sound of Wanda crying and Simon yelling in strained, gasping sobs. The two rooms holding the rest of the band and crew are open, all the girls out in various states of wakefulness and dress, everyone single one of them watching in shock.

Natasha curls in on herself, avoids looking at any of them, and takes a step off the sidewalk.

“You fucking bitch!” Simon’s hand grips her bicep and yanks her hard back onto the sidewalk, throwing her against the wall. He stands a few inches taller than her but he’s nothing she would ever be afraid of, not physically. She stares up at him with a look that apparently infuriates him, because he grabs her by the shoulders and starts to shake her.

“You fucking dykes think you’re untouchable! That you can just have whatever the bloody fuck you want and it doesn’t matter who you hurt!? You think you can just walk right in and take what’s mine!?”

“Simon!” It’s several voices instead of one, a smatter of panic and there are hands pulling Simon back off of her; Carol and Wanda and Sharon holding him back. Darcy shoves him until she can get between them, her hands on Natasha, cupping her cold cheeks.

“Nat, are you--”

“Fuck you, you piece of shit! You’re _trash!_ You’re disgusting, you--”

“Simon!” Wanda is screaming now, gripping him by the shirt and pulling him toward the motel room, still trying to hold her towel up. “Stop it! Calm down and talk to me. Come on, let’s go in and talk. _Please._ ”

There’s the sound of a door opening and rustling and then it’s closed again. There are six pairs of eyes on her, a bunch of hands and voices coming from all sides, asking questions and practically begging for a response from Natasha that she can’t give. She just can’t.

She breaks away from them and walks right out into the rain, weaving through the cars in the parking lot until she gets to the bus. 

It’s blessedly quiet inside when she gets the door closed again, the rain battering against the metal roof but the voices are gone. All of them.

She walks in a daze down the aisle between the bunks, stopping for a second next to Wanda’s, her eyes focusing on the little altar there on her bedside table; the tiny bundle of feathers, the rocks and seashells, the small vial of water, and the white candle. 

She wonders if Wanda has gods she prays to, and what she asks them for. If she asked them for help to break away from Simon or strength to pull away from Natasha.

She falls into her own bed, the sheets rumpled, headphones still tucked under her pillow. She pushes them into her ears and plugs them into her phone with shaking fingers, her breathing harsh and fast now, her vision blurring at the edges as hysteria finally finds her, rushing over her in a wave.

She drowns in it, the music coming through the headphones only background noise when she finally gives over to the panic.


	9. let it be broke

Natasha doesn’t know how much time has passed when there’s a knock on the door.

The panic attack has left her drained to the point of exhaustion, unable to move from where she’s curled up tight in her bunk on the bus. Her phone is nearly dead but she doesn’t know who to call anyway, doesn’t want to involve anyone else in this. This is her fault, her mess. 

She knows she’ll have to deal with it alone.

“Nat?”

Wanda’s voice is all but swallowed by the unending sound of rain, but Natasha could hear her even if she was drowning. She turns over on her back, trying to will herself to get up, to go answer the door, to find the words to start begging Wanda to--

To what?

The door opens, the sound of rain nearly deafening now. Wanda steps up onto the bus and the rain goes back to being muffled again, background noise.

Natasha stares up at the ceiling painted to look like a starry sky, hearing and feeling and smelling Wanda approaching, but she can’t look at her. Not yet.

She’s not ready for this to start ending.

“Nat.”

It’s a plea, Wanda’s voice smaller than Natasha’s ever heard it. She sounds wrecked, like she’s been crying, like she’s still crying. Natasha forgets herself and finally glances over at her.

Wanda is sitting on Maria’s bunk just across the aisle. She’s dressed in jeans and a hoodie--Natasha’s hoodie, her hair wet and pulled back in an uncharacteristically tight ponytail. Tears fall tired and unforgotten from her eyes that are as big as a little girl’s and trained down on her tangled hands. 

Natasha forces herself to sit up.

She slides back until she’s pressed against the wall of the bus, and she draws her legs up to wrap her arms around them. She feels young and like she’s about to be beaten severely, like she’d done something bad but there was a good reason, like she knows she deserves to be punished but she also knows she’s been punished enough in her life to make up for all of the terrible things she could ever do.

She’s too tired to cry.

“I, um,” Wanda starts, the words crackling and thin. She clears her throat and starts again. “I don’t really--”

“Just say it,” Natasha cuts in, sounding much more apathetic than feels. She still can’t look at her, not even when Wanda looks up to try and meet her eyes.

“Nat--”

“Just fucking say it, Wanda. Say it.”

“I’m leaving,” Wanda says, and the words are such a shock that Natasha actually looks up, meeting her gaze head-on.

“...What?”

“I can’t--” Her face crumples, tears rushing down her red cheeks, her chin trembling as she shakes her head. She scrubs at her face with the sleeves of her hoodie, shaking her head so hard her ponytail falls over her shoulder and stays there. “I can’t be here anymore. I can’t… I need time to--”

“Time to what? To come up with a list of ways to win him back? Of things you’ll do to get him to let you stay? What?”

“We’ve been together for almost two years, Nat. We _live_ together. He’s helping me pay my tuition. This isn’t just... “

“Just a fuck? An affair? Not like what you had with me, right? With him, it actually _means_ something?” Her words are razor-edged and cruel, and the way Wanda is looking at her will haunt her for a long time.

“Nat, what? God. _No._ No, that’s not. Jesus, that’s not what I think of… of this. Of us. Why would you…” Her eyebrows pinch together as she shakes her head in disbelief, pure hurt laced through every single movement. “Don’t do that. Don’t talk to me like that to try and make me say something mean to you. Please don’t do that.”

“Why not? Simon does. He treats you like shit and you’re fucking in love with him. Maybe I’ve just been too nice.” Panic is sneaking up again, pushing up fast into her throat, making it hard for her to breathe. She has to get Wanda out of here before it starts. She can’t let her see.

“I just need time to think,” Wanda says softly, leaning forward, hand lifted like she wants to touch Natasha but she thinks better of it. “This just… I never expected this. Everything just happened so fast, and I just wasn’t prepared--”

“And you think I was?!” She flies up to her feet now, her heart pounding in her ears, her legs tingling as she paces, pulling hard at her hair, breaking off vivid red strands between her trembling fingers. “That’s fucking _life_ , Wanda. You can’t be prepared for anything. That’s not how it works. You just deal with it as it fucking comes.”

“I’m trying, Nat. I’m trying to deal with it. I just… I just need time.” Wanda sounds just as tired as she is, all the fight gone from her voice. Natasha turns to look down at her, trying so hard not to let the way Wanda’s hands are covering her face, how small her shoulders look when she’s curled in on herself like that break her heart. 

“What did you tell him?”

“What do you mean?” Wanda sniffles, wiping at her nose with the now wet sleeve and looking up at Natasha with puffy, incredibly green eyes. 

“About us? About what you’re going to do? What did you tell him?” She stares right into her eyes, refusing to let her look away, refusing to back down from this now. She already feels wounded, already feels like she’s bleeding. 

Let it bleed.

“That… that it wasn’t just sex. It was more than that. That I care about you.” Wanda’s lashes are so long, so black and damp with tears. She shouldn’t be beautiful when she looks so broken. “And he… he begged me to… to--”

“He wants you to stay,” Natasha realizes, her arms wrapping around herself as it sinks in. She slides back down onto her bed, unable to stand anymore. “Doesn’t he?”

Wanda nods, head down again, her entire body trembling like she can barely stay upright.

“And… and what did you tell him?”

“I just need time,” she whispers almost to herself, like it’s a mantra, like it’s a lifeline. She looks up again, meeting Natasha’s eyes pleadingly, and she does actually move this time, crawling across the aisle and stopping right in front of Natasha, crouching there in front of where she’s curled up on herself again.

Natasha can’t pull away when Wanda’s cold, shaking hands slide up to cup her cheeks, can’t do anything but close her eyes and breathe her in. Wanda rests her forehead against Natasha’s, her breath warm and familiar and so near. Their noses brush, mouths ghosting like they can’t help it. 

“Please,” Wanda whispers, almost too soft to be heard. “I need you to try and understand. Even if he doesn’t, even if nobody else does. I need _you_ to. Just… give me some time. Be patient with me. Please, Natasha. _Please_.”

Natasha finds herself nodding because she can’t help it, because she’s just as tangled up in this as Wanda, as lost in this trembling girl as Wanda is in her. She feels the wet slip of tears on her cheeks, and she doesn’t know if they’re Wanda’s or her own.

When they kiss it’s like a goodbye, like the single second before one of them stops breathing; it’s desperate and so intimate it physically hurts. Natasha holds onto Wanda’s face while Wanda touches hers, cradles her just the same, she presses kiss after kiss to Wanda’s mouth that only ends when Wanda pulls away to kiss Natasha’s cheeks, soaking up tears with her worried, red lips.

Foreheads pressed hard again, digging in tight enough to bruise. A horn blares outside, uncaring and impatient.

“I’ve gotta go,” Wanda tells her in a mumble against her trembling lips. Natasha holds even tighter, physically doesn’t know how to let her go.”I’ll talk to you soon, I promise. Just… just take care of yourself. Tell the girls bye for me.”

Another blast of the horn, and it’s enough this time to make Wanda stand up, staring down at Natasha like she can’t stand to look away. A loud knock sounds on the door, making them both jump.

“Wanda, _now_!” Simon barks.

“Coming! I’m…” She turns around, picking up the bag Natasha hadn’t even seen her come in with and walking over to her little bunk, stuffing all her little altar items in as carefully as she can, shoving the couple of books and notebooks in with them and closing the bag up again.

She turns around at the top of the steps, and Natasha looks right back at her, realizing in that very second that she’s in love with her, with that girl right there. She loves her enough to propose to her on one knee, on both knees, she wants to keep her for herself forever, just like Steve has with Bucky.

“Bye,” Wanda whispers.

Three clomps of her boots and the door opens again, a loud rush of rain and then quiet again. Gone.

She’s gone.

 

The door opens again too soon, and Natasha jumps up when it does, her heart in her throat.

“Wanda, I--”

Simon appears on the top step, a baseball cap shoved on his head, the bill down low to cover his eyes. His hands are in his jacket pockets, and his face is drawn, shadowed.

Natasha stares at him, completely unprepared for this conversation. She sits down at the table near the front of the bus, her head down, and waits for him to speak.

“You’re fucking my girlfriend,” Simon finally says, fury making the words shake. Natasha’s hands tremble on her thighs. She doesn’t look up.

“I’m not going to apologize. I’m not sorry for it. I don’t regret it,” Natasha replies. And maybe it’s cruel, but it’s honest. And she’s got to be honest with somebody. Simon sucks in a deep breath, his anger so intense now that Natasha nearly cowers.

_You aren’t his to punish. You are in control here, just as much as he is. You can take care of yourself. You’re not little anymore._

She lifts her head finally, meeting Simon’s gaze head-on, staring into the strained, red-rimmed electric blue of his eyes.

“You’re _fucking_ my girlfriend,” he growls, his hands in fists at his sides now as he leans down to put his face in hers. “You will apologize.”

“Only if you apologize for treating her like she’s something you can throw in a corner and ignore until it’s convenient for you.” She stares into his eyes, watching him process the words. He scoffs at her finally, standing up to his full height and folding his arms over his chest.

“What, you think you can treat her better? That you have some magic, dyke tongue that can make her come a few times and she’ll fall in love with you? You were an experiment, Natasha. She was testing you out to see if pussy worked for her. And it doesn’t. Experiment over. Are you really so desperate that you couldn’t see that?” He sneers at her, his face pinched with mock sympathy.

Natasha smiles at him, slow and serene, an entire lifetime of keeping emotions below the surface preparing her to hide how much those words affect her. She stands up now, her posture loose but she’s prepared. Just in case.

“That’s funny. It’s like you don’t know your own girlfriend or something. Because Wanda is bi. She’s had girlfriends before. Did she not tell you that?” She tips her head to the side and blinks at him in theatrical concern.

Simon gives an aborted laugh, obviously trying to rein in his reaction and find his apathy again. Natasha watches with a smirk, not missing a single second of the conflict that races across his face. 

He steps in close finally, his eyes narrowed, his voice dropping low.

“This is how it’s going to play out, Nat, so listen fucking carefully,” he grits out. “We are going to finish this bloody tour, and you are going to keep your goddamn mouth shut and play the guitar and take your shift driving the bus, and that’s fucking it. You speak to me like that again, I’m out. And I really don’t think you want the rest of your band suffering for your fuck-ups. I don’t want to speak to you. I don’t want you speaking to me. You’re as good as invisible to me. Is that understood?”

Natasha’s heart races in barely contained rage, every muscle in her body tense. Their eyes burn into each other’s, but she can’t move, can’t even nod.

“Is that understood?” he yells, his breath hot on her face.

“Sure,” she whispers, holding his gaze for a few more seconds before he turns away, stomping back down the stairs and off the bus again. She stands completely still, breathing in and out a few times to try and calm down.

It doesn’t work.

She looks around for something to sink her fists into, a solid surface that will break the skin of her knuckles and draw her attention away from everything thrumming under her skin, but nothing here belongs to her, nothing that she could destroy and not regret.

She walks over to the fridge across the aisle from the table, opening it up and squinting in to see its contents. She grabs the half-empty bottle of whiskey and goes back to her bed, unscrewing the cap as she goes.

Nothing here to destroy but herself.


	10. she dreams in red

The garnet glows in the low light from her lamp, that kind of red so deep it’s nearly black. It’s warm from where she’s held it in her hand for the better part of two hours, and there’s an inexplicable tingle running through her palm and her fingers. 

It’s Wanda’s magic, she decides. It has to be.

The compass is smooth, the metal dark from wear and warm just like the garnet. She presses her fingertip hard to the arrow pointing north, disappointed when it doesn’t puncture. 

She reaches blindly for the whiskey bottle buried in her blankets, twisting the cap off with clumsy fingers and tipping the bottle back to her mouth. She makes a noise of confusion when nothing hits her tongue but drops.

“Fuck,” she mumbles, tossing the empty bottle away and throwing the cap petulantly. “Darcy?”

“Yeh?” Darcy is in her own bunk on the bus, probably watching some shitty horror flick with lots of bare tits.

“Outta whiskey.”

No one on the bus speaks. Sharon is behind the wheel, and everyone else is tucked away into the own bunks, sleeping or reading or doing something that keeps them from talking.

Natasha had really managed to take the life out of the party over the last few days.

“I don’t have any whiskey,” Darcy finally replies, sighing as she climbs up from her bed and shuffles over to Natasha. She’s not wearing a bra under her Wayne’s World t-shirt, and her legs are bare. Natasha turns over onto her back and stares up at her, catching a glimpse of Darcy’s panties.

“Hot pink,” she mumbles, a grin tugging on one side of her mouth. “Nice.”

Darcy sighs again. “Nat--”

“Just stand right there for a minute. ‘s good.” She licks her lips, tipping her head a little even as Darcy is tugging down on her shirt and kicking Nat half-heartedly with her bare foot.

“You’re such a creeper. I have some birthday cake flavored vodka. Take it or leave it.”

“Hey, I was born in Russia. You think I’m gonna say no to vodka?”

Darcy disappears again, only gone for a few seconds before she’s back with the vodka and two plastic cups.

“Not letting you drink alone,” she says as she lowers down to sit at Natasha’s feet, forcing her to sit up. “At least not something that tastes like cake. That’s super sad.”

“Your face is super sad,” Natasha retorts, taking the cup Darcy offers her and tipping her head back to down its contents. She wrinkles her nose. “Dude. That seriously tastes like fuckin’ birthday cake.”

Darcy takes a sip from her own cup, leaning back on the nightstand and shrugging.

“Want some more?”

Natasha only hesitates for posterity. She holds her cup out and Darcy fills it.

“You heard from her?” Darcy’s voice is soft now, especially since Simon isn’t that far away and might be listening. Natasha pauses, vodka held in her mouth, burning her tongue. It tastes like vomit on the way down. She shakes her head.

“Texted her last night, but.” She stares down into her cup, watching the liquid ripple from the vibrations of the bus. “Guess she doesn’t want to talk to me.”

“I’m sure this is hard for her,” Darcy replies, resting her cold toes on Natasha’s thigh. Natasha glances up at her, not really meaning to glare, but she’s too drunk to school her face the way she usually does. Darcy raises her eyebrows. “What? I mean, she was the one in the middle. She’s the one who has to make a choice. That’s just… gotta be hard.”

“Yeah, must be hard to have two people in love with you,” she mutters bitterly, not meaning a word of it. She finishes the rest of her liquor and tucks the cup in the corner between the bed and the wall before sliding down across the mattress again. She tugs on Darcy’s leg until she lowers it, and she closes her eyes as she rests her cheek against Darcy’s soft, warm thigh.

“Are you kidding? You’re the lady killer. You have chicks all over the country in love with you. Or at least your mouth.” Darcy tucks her fingers into Natasha’s messy mohawk, scritching at her scalp exactly how she likes it. Natasha snorts at her words, reaching up to pinch Darcy’s inner thigh.

“Shuddup.”

“Do you remember when we first met?” Darcy’s being quiet again, her voice tight with pain like it always is when they talk about their past. Natasha turns onto her back and opens her eyes, looking out the window at the vague points of stars in the sky, at the passing streetlights. 

“Yeah,” she finally replies.

“It was just you and Steve and Bucky in that room, sharing a bed. You were such a fucking mess back then.” Darcy’s fingers are tracing along her hairline now, down over the curve of her ear. Natasha glances up at her, wanting to be offended, to at least try and defend herself, but it’s true. She’s way past the point of being able to lie to Darcy about anything.

“I know.”

“You were drowning,” Darcy tells her, her voice wavering. Natasha keeps her eyes on the window, refuses to look up at her, to see the emotion on her face. “And… I’m not asking you to talk about it--”

“I’m not--”

“--but I just. I just don’t want you to go there again. To fall down that rabbit hole.”

“This is a different situation, Darce,” Natasha says, her throat tight. The vodka is mixing with the whiskey in her empty stomach, and it churns there because of the conversation, making her nauseous. “I’m… this is for me. Wanda was--”

“ _Is_ ,” Darcy corrects gently.

“Is… she’s mine. She’s… she’s just for me. This isn’t about anybody but the two of us.”

“I know, love,” Darcy whispers, thumbs pressing to Natasha’s temples, rubbing them while she talks. Natasha is unspeakably grateful for her. “I know that. I just want you to be okay. I want you to take care of yourself. I’m not saying you need to give up on her because I don’t believe that. I just… you can’t keep doing this. You can’t be drunk twenty-four seven. You can’t just keep this all to yourself, because it’s only hurting _you_.”

“Exactly.” It’s mean, selfish, but it’s true. The only person she wants to hurt is herself. “So what?”

“So, I care about you. I don’t want you to hurt, no matter who’s doing it.” Darcy sighs, resting her head against the side of the bus. Natasha lets her eyes close again. “Have you talked to Bucky or Steve since--”

“No. I don’t want to get them involved in my shit. Not in this. Promise me you won’t say anything.” She turns and looks at Darcy for the first time, meeting her eyes even as her vision swims. Darcy looks down at her, hair dark and messy in waves around her shoulders, her eyes so deeply blue in the low light. Natasha used to crave her, used to want to get her hands on her again, just one more time.

Being in love fucking sucks.

“I promise,” Darcy tells her. She moves then stretching out on the bed behind Natasha, cornering her against the wall and tucking up behind her. Darcy’s breasts are so big and soft against her back, her body warm and plush and comforting. Natasha relaxes in her arms when Darcy wraps around her, pressing a kiss to the back of Natasha’s neck.

Natasha keeps her eyes closed tight and pretends with everything in her that she’s Wanda.

 

There’s actually a dressing room backstage at Rake’s Bar in Cincinnati, and she’s sitting on the floor of it the next night, kinda drunk but mostly just feeling good. Her phone is beside her, unread text messages from Bucky flashing on the screen, but Natasha ignores them for now.

She sings with the New York Dolls under her breath as she pulls her guitar out of its case, pulling the packs of guitar strings out of the plastic bag by her feet. She loves restringing her guitar, loves the ritual of it, the satisfaction of tuning it again, of treating her girl right.

Sif is taking a nap on the couch, and Carol is doing her makeup in the dingy mirror, doing her best to ignore Natasha’s existence which suits her just fine. She changes out all of the strings and tucks the tuning key into her bra when she’s done. The New York Dolls get replaced by her tuning app, and she adjusts each string until it sounds pitch perfect.

She’s just about to put her guitar back in the case when she sees it.

It’s barely visible at all, just a faint glint of shine on the matte black surface, but there’s something drawn onto the back of her guitar. She squints at it, trying to decide if maybe she’s drunker than she thought, pulling it back into her lap and turning it over so she can stare down at the back of it.

Kamala wanders in with a beer in one hand and her phone in the other, eyes down while she texts. Natasha speaks up before Carol can grab her attention.

“Kam, can you come here for a sec?”

She saunters over and drops down into a crouch next to Natasha.

“What’s up?”

“Do you, uh.” She looks back down at the guitar, grabbing it by the neck to turn it a little from one side to the other, trying to get the drawn lines to shine. “Do you see that?”

Kamala leans down closer to peer at it, beer cradled in both hands.

“Huh,” she finally says, sitting back. “Yeah, I do. That’s weird. Did you put it there?”

Natasha looks up at her, raising an eyebrow.

“Oh, yeah, duh,” Kamala mumbles, her cheeks flushing. “Why would you be asking if I see it if you--anyway. Yeah, it’s… like it’s done in Sharpie or something. It looks like a…”

She lifts her finger to draw vaguely in the air.

“A sigil! Yeah, that’s the word.” She stands up like she’s solved the mystery, lifting her beer in a salute to Natasha.

“A sigil,” Natasha repeats quietly, running her fingers over it lightly, not wanting to wipe it off at all. This has Wanda’s lovely witchiness written all over it, the lines of it smooth and graceful. It doesn’t make any sense to Natasha, doesn’t look like anything she’s ever seen before.

“Maybe it’s for good luck,” Kamala offers, looking a little shy now. “Or for playing well or something.”

“Maybe,” Natasha replies, trying to sound as unaffected as possible. She doesn’t know when Wanda drew it, doesn’t really know how she missed it until now. Her throat is tight with unexpected emotion, her hands trembling a little as she shoves the guitar back into the case. “Like I need help with that, right?”

Kamala laughs because she’s a good friend, but she’s smart enough not to try and extend the conversation. She walks over to Carol and hops up on the counter beside her, taking the eyeliner pencil from her girlfriend and tugging Carol to stand between her legs so she can help her draw a dramatic cat-eye. 

Natasha stands up, suddenly craving something hard and burning and poisonous, her mind on the liquor store across the street as she walks out of the dressing room and through the dark hallway to get to the door that opens up into the alley.

_what does the sigil mean?_

She shouldn’t have texted Wanda. Should just leave it alone, shouldn’t set herself up to be disappointed when Wanda doesn’t reply back.

And she doesn’t.

Natasha grabs a basket in the liquor store and starts to fill it. She doesn’t stop until it’s too heavy to add anything else. 

She goes back to the bus, shuts herself in, and cracks open the first bottle.

 

It happens during “Four Fingers.” She’d been sloppy drunk by the time the show started, and it’s only gotten worse the hotter it gets onstage and the more she sweats. She stumbles over and sits down on top of her amp, cigarette dangling from her lips like she’s fuckin’ Slash, her head down while she strums along a beat too slow.

“Nat,” Sif hisses in the middle of the song from somewhere off to her left. “Snap the fuck out of it.”

Natasha grunts, lost under the cacophony of sound they’re producing, her fingers feeling so heavy and numb she’s not even sure she’s holding her pick anymore, if she’s holding the right places on the neck, if she even knows what fucking song they’re doing.

She gives up, stops during the second verse. She leans back against the speaker and sighs, sweat pouring from her temple and down the sides of her face. She just needs a minute. Needs to take a nap, that’s all. She’s just tired. She doesn’t sleep much anymore.

“Nat!”

“Shh,” she hisses, wrapping her arms around her guitar, Wanda’s sigil pressed against her bare stomach. It’s only been four days, but time has been fucking with her lately. She’s used to having huge memory gaps, to not being able to recall days and months and years of her life, but it seems like another lifetime that Wanda was here. Or maybe like she was never hear at all.

“ _Nat!_ ”

Surely she was a dream. There’s no way she was real. It’s not possible to actually be that happy.

At least it was a good dream.

“Nat, goddamnit.” 

Somebody grabs her by the arm, squeezing her bicep so hard she yelps in pain. She opens her eyes and finds Carol staring at her in terrifying fury.

“Get the fuck off the stage. You’re fucking everything up. Jesus Christ.” Carol shoves her toward the back and she stumbles, reaching out to hold onto the speaker before she falls flat on her face.

“Give me the guitar,” Maria says out of nowhere. Someone is pulling the guitar off her body and somebody else is guiding her away, toward the darkness of backstage, away from the lights and the sound and Carol’s anger.

“She’s always so serious,” Natasha says to the owner of the hands on her, her eyes barely open as she shuffles in blind faith in front of the person.

“Get to the bus, Nat,” Sharon tells her. “Sleep it off.”

“I am tired,” Natasha admits. “Thanks, babe.”

Sharon says something else to her that she misses, but she doesn’t care enough to ask her to repeat it. There’s a faint drizzle outside, lightning sparking in the sky somewhere in the distance once they leave the bar. She stumbles up the steps to the bus and turns to say something else to Sharon only for the door to close between them. 

“Oh,” she says, watching Sharon hurry off back toward the Rake. “Fine then.”

She falls down onto Wanda’s bed, burying her face in the pillow that still smells like her hair.

“My baby,” she whispers into the cotton, tears burning in her eyes that get soaked up by the pillow immediately. She wraps her arms around it and gives over to the sobs that push up from her chest, and she cries until she’s too exhausted to do it anymore.

And then she sleeps.

 

When she wakes up, it’s still dark out. Lightning makes the whole sky bright for a single second, followed by a prickling silence and a low rumble of thunder. It’s hot on the bus, and she strips off her shirt after a ridiculously prolonged struggle, leaving her in a sports bra and her jeans. She rummages around the bed for her box of liquor bottles, grunting in annoyance when she doesn’t feel it.

It’s only then that she remembers that she’s in Wanda’s bed.

“I took it.”

Natasha lifts her head to glare at the voice. Carol is sitting across the aisle on Sif’s bed, her hair wet from a shower, her long legs sprawled out like she’s been here for awhile. Natasha forces herself to sit up even though it makes her dizzy as fuck, and she closes her eyes to the spinning of the room when she slumps back against the wall of the bus.

“Fuck you give it back.”

“Not a chance, Romanoff. You’re being a huge fuckup. That’s not happening on my watch anymore.”

Natasha groans, reaching up to wipe a heavy, numb hand over her sweaty face.

“I’m a fuckin’ adult. You don’t get t’tell me what to do. You don’t get t’make my decisions.”

It’s quiet for a long moment, so long in fact that Natasha wonders if Carol left, did some kind of majestic backflip out of one of the tiny windows and flew off into the night.

“You could totally do that,” Natasha tells her.

Carol sighs, doesn’t ask for an explanation. There’s some rustling and then a weight on the bed beside her. A sharp, wet coldness presses against the back of her hand and she stirs, jerking away from it while she opens her eyes and looks down. A bottle of water is pressed into her hands.

“Drink it.”

Natasha squints over at her.

“You’re so fuckin’ beautiful, you know it?”

Carol smirks, her face softening the tiniest bit.

“I know. Drink.”

She unscrews the cap and lifts the water to her lips, drinking down a few, freezing mouthfuls that soothe the burn in her throat from all the other shit she’s had today. She goes to put it down but Carol’s hand is on her elbow, forcing the bottle back up.

“All of it,” Carol orders.

Natasha obeys because she’s too drunk not to, pressing the bottle to her mouth again and guzzling down its contents. She hands Carol the empty bottle and wipes her mouth off on the back of her hand. sighing as she settles back again.

“Happy, Mom?”

Carol shrugs, capping the bottle again and tossing it at the trash can near the table and nailing it, of course.

“You can call me whatever you want, Nat. Somebody’s gotta do something. I can’t just watch you do this.”

“Yer just pissed ‘cause I fucked up the show.” Natasha drags her legs up and tries to reach down and untie her boots, her fingers slow and dumb and Carol ends up doing it for her.

“Yeah, I am pissed about that. But I’m also really fucking worried about you. You’re killing yourself, Nat. You can’t keep doing this. Have you eaten anything at all today?”

Natasha falls quiet in thought while Carol loosens up her boots and tugs them off of her, helping her out of her socks too until her stinky feet are exposed to the air finally. She wiggles her toes and reminds herself for the millionth time that she needs to paint her toenails.

“...do food-flavored vodkas count?” she finally offers.

“Damnit, Nat.” Carol punches her not very gently in the thigh before she stands up and wanders toward the back of the bus. Natasha closes her eyes again, wrapping her arms around her knees.

“Fine, didn’t wanna talk to you anyway,” she mumbles.

Carol returns with a box of cold pizza and a zip bag of apple slices. She sits back down next to her and grabs a slice herself, nodding for Natasha to do the same. They eat in quiet while it starts to rain outside, those warm, nighttime rains that just spread the humidity out instead of alleviating it. 

The apple feels so good in her mouth, tastes soft and sweet and safe. She chews with relish, her eyes closing again, letting the flavor stay on her tongue for a long while before swallowing.

“Tastes like Wanda,” she whispers, hating herself for saying it but she needs to.

“I know you miss her,” Carol says after a long beat, probably going against her instincts to tease Natasha about romanticizing the taste of pussy. “But… you had to know this was the very likely outcome of it all, right? You had to have thought about it?”

And maybe that’s the stupidest fucking part of it all. Because she _hadn’t_. She’d let herself get swept up in it, let herself get hopeful, let herself believe her own bullshit about things working out and being happy. And she apparently says it all out loud because Carol hums, passing Natasha another bottle of water that is already opened for her.

“I get that. I really do. But you can’t keep lingering on this, Nat. Not the way you do it. Wallowing is fine, being depressed and reclusive is fine. But you can’t drink yourself to death. That’s not an option. Maria has a hot ass, but she’s shit as a guitarist.”

Natasha pulls herself out of her gloom to look over at Carol with wide eyes.

“Maria played?”

Carol snorts, giving a dramatic roll of sky blue eyes.

“If you wanna call it that. Seriously, that can’t happen again. We need you. We _love_ you, Nat. Enough to be a pain in the ass when you’re spiraling.”

Natasha doesn’t reply to that, doesn’t have anything to say that isn’t sappy. And she and Carol don’t do sappy. Carol reaches over and digs around in Natasha’s pocket, pulling out her phone and tapping on the screen, her face lit up in the relative darkness of the bus.

“...What’re you doing?”

“ _You_ are calling Steve.” She pushes the phone into Natasha’s hands, and all she sees is her pale, flush-faced, red-rim eyed self. Apparently she’s FaceTiming with Steve.

“God, I look like shit,” she mumbles, reaching up to fix her hair just as Steve answers.

“Wow, you really do,” he replies, looking tired but beautiful as always. She can see the dark fan of Bucky’s hair against his chest and she smiles in spite of herself.

“Is he asleep?”

“No, he’s not,” Bucky replies, lifting his head to blink up at the screen Steve must be holding up over their heads while they’re curled up in bed. “But he is interrupted.”

Natasha quirks an eyebrow.

“Oh, yeah?”

“Yeah,” Bucky says with a mischievous smile, his face turning in against Steve’s chest, mouth brushing it. “You wanna watch?”

“Buck,” Steve admonishes.

“And now I’m leaving,” Carol says, grabbing a slice of apple out of the bag and jumping up from the bed. She gives Natasha a wave before bounding down the steps and off the bus, pulling the door closed behind her, leaving Natasha with Steve and Bucky and god, that’s exactly what she needed.

“Maybe later,” she finally says, putting the food aside and sprawling out on the bed again, curling up under Wanda’s blankets and resting her head on the pillow that still smells so much like her. She holds the phone on the pillow and watches her two favorite boys in the world snuggle up together. “God, I miss you two.”

“Nat, what’s wrong? Did something happen?” Steve’s expression slips from playfulness to concern, and he’s really looking at her now, probably diagnosing her as he goes.

“He found out,” she says simply, not really in the mood to tell stories. “And she’s gone. She left.”

There’s a lot of movement then, some shifting on the bed and fumbling with the phone, but when everything settles again, Steve and Bucky are both sitting up in bed and the lamp is on, illuminating them both much more clearly.

“Did…” Bucky starts, his eyes so wide he looks heartbreaking. “Did she…”

Natasha shrugs as tears fill her eyes. She tries to keep her face carefully blank.

“She said she needed time. So, I don’t know. I don’t know what’s going on.”

“Are you drunk, Nat?”

Steve is looking at her like he already knows the answer, and Natasha feels suddenly ashamed. Tears spill from her eyes and she looks away from the screen, from their familiar faces, from all the concern and love she sees there. 

_You don’t deserve it,_ her mind tells her viciously.

“It’s over,” Natasha continues, her eyes on the stars on the ceiling, fingers trembling as they hold up the phone. “I know it’s over. It’s like being given the death sentence and just waiting for the execution.”

“She cares about you,” Bucky says, soft but adamant. “Nat, I don’t even think you know how much. She... “

“Shut up,” she cuts in, shaking her head and almost dropping the phone. “Don’t say that shit to me. Don’t--”

“Natasha, don’t talk to him like that,” Steve warns, his voice low. She deflates then, reaching up to scrub hard at her face.

“Sorry, babe,” she whispers.

“Please don’t drink anymore,” Steve pleads quietly. “Nat, we… we’ve been through too much. _You’ve_ been through too much to let this sink you. Please remember yourself in all this. This isn’t who you are.”

“I’m in love with her,” she finally says out loud, and it ruins her. The sob she lets out is soul-deep and embarrassingly loud. She buries her face in the covers, already trying to stop crying, already trying to explain away her outburst, to blame it on the alcohol, but Steve and Bucky don’t need the explanations. They’ve seen Natasha at every single stage, they know who she is in her lowest lows. And so she just lets herself cry.

“I love her,” she clarifies after a long moment, wiping her face with the blanket and staring at the screen almost pleadingly, needing them to understand. “She’s my… she’s who I’ve been looking for. Who I’ve always been looking for. I know she is. I know it, Stevie. I know it.”

“I believe you,” he replies, so earnest that Natasha knows he does. “Hey, you don’t have to convince me, okay?”

“You guys can fix this,” Bucky says, his eyes locked on the screen, feeling like they’re holding tight with her own. “You’re gonna be home so soon, Nat. Just a few more days, and you’ll be home, and you can fix this. I know you can.”

“And if you can’t… we’re here,” Steve adds, voicing the other side of her mind that she so desperately needs to hear on top of Bucky’s optimism. “You’ve always got us. We’re your family, right?”

“Yeah,” Natasha whispers, trying to give them a smile even though it shakes. “You are.”

“We love you,” he tells her, reaching up to touch the screen. Her smile grows even as more tears fill her eyes.

“Thanks, you guys.” She sighs, rubbing at her eyes until the tears are gone, absorbed into her skin. She gives a laugh that sounds alarmingly like a sob, shaking her head with a sigh. “Fuckin’ drunken crying. I’m sorry. And I’m sorry for interrupting.”

“Offer’s still on the table,” Bucky chimes in, grinning when Natasha laughs for real.

“I would say yes, but I think I’m gonna go pass out again.” Her eyes droop even as she says it, the food in her belly almost making her feel human again for the first time in days.

“Call us tomorrow,” Steve says in that way that leaves no room for argument. Natasha is grateful for it.

“Promise.”

They all take turns pressing sloppy kisses to their screens and then they’re gone, her screen blinking back to her wallpaper which is of Wanda’s legs tangled with her own in this very bed, on a warm afternoon that feels like years ago now.

 _Please_ , she prays to Wanda’s gods in her last moment of consciousness. _Please let us be happy._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the next chapter is the last one, y'all!


	11. break it down again

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just for those who need visuals (you'll know when you need you come click on these): [suit](https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/3c/b8/3c/3cb83c82d8cbadde044c8a702f3d3aaf.jpg), [dress](https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/9d/34/35/9d3435721d5a3472e0d61a77a5bdf605.jpg), and [toy](http://www.tantusinc.com/products/realdoe-stout).

The next few days go by in a blur of music, writing, avoiding Simon, and trying very, very hard not to think of--

Well. Yanno.

Darcy had found a little box of teabags when she was straightening up Wanda’s old bunk, and she’d given them to Natasha without a word. Natasha had known immediately they were Wanda’s, made by her, crafted lovingly with more than a little magic. 

(Natasha has never believed in magic, never believed in anything in her life. But maybe she does now, just a little bit.)

There are about fifteen bags overall, some of them labeled normal things like _sleep_ and _calm_ and _energy_ , but there are also some with strange things written on them in Wanda’s lovely, curling handwriting, things like _astral travel_ and _spirit communication_ and _sex & lust_. 

She’d tucked all the odd ones aside and kept the others for herself, and she’s somehow managed to not drink a single drop of alcohol the whole week; just keeps herself hydrated with a shitton of water and Wanda’s magical teas.

She swears--she _swears_ \--they help.

Communication with Wanda is non-existent, and by the time they get to Buffalo for the second to last show, Natasha is barely hanging on to her carefully curated mild sadness that masks the despair thrumming just beneath her skin.

She’s in bed next to Darcy in the hotel room, staring out the door that leads onto the balcony. It’s incredibly quiet, the other girls sound asleep after a night of most everyone being drunk enough to watch Sharon and Maria have sex in the very bed she’s now lying in.

She can’t sleep, can’t let go of her own restlessness, of the sadness that just won’t leave her, can’t ignore the throb between her legs that she’d neglected earlier when everyone else had gotten off watching them.

She wants to go out on the balcony and smoke, wants to go down the street to the all-night liquor store she’d seen and grab a bottle of Jameson and drown herself in it, but she doesn’t have the desire to do anything but stay very still and count her own breaths.

Her phone vibrates under the pillow.

She reaches for it immediately, worry overtaking any other thought in her head as she flashes back to all those nights in years past where she’d gotten a text or a phone call and she’d ended up in a chair in the emergency room lobby next to an inconsolable Steve.

It’s from Wanda.

She stares at the screen, unable to take her eyes off the name to even read the text until it goes dark again. She turns it back on and opens the text, the sound of her heart so loud in the otherwise quiet room.

_go to sleep. do this meditation:_

A link follows in another text, and Natasha clicks it without hesitation. YouTube opens and she hits pause long enough to grab her headphones from the nightstand and plug them in, tucking the buds in her ears. She goes back to the text and blinks at it in awe, forcing herself to snap out of it and reply.

_how did you know i was awake?_

_i miss you. how are you?_

She watches the screen, her breathing loud and fast, the phone clutched in both hands like Wanda is going to jump out of it and she’s going to need to catch her. She’s terrified that Wanda won’t reply. When she finally starts typing, Natasha lets out the breath she’d been holding.

_i’m alright. i knew because we’re connected, nat. please go to sleep. and take care of yourself. you’ll be home in two days._

A pause and Wanda is typing again. It feels like an embarrassment of riches. Natasha blinks fast through the tears in her eyes.

_the sigil says “i am a powerful, beautiful woman, and my music touches all who hear it.”_

And then:

_do the meditation and sleep. goodnight_

Natasha starts to type a reply, wanting to keep her talking, but something stops her. She deletes every word.

_goodnight, love_

It’s the closest she’s ever come to saying it. She closes the text, self-consciousness heating up her cheeks in the dark. She goes back to the video and presses play, relaxing back against the pillow and letting her eyes close as a woman’s soothing voice starts to speak.

She’s asleep in ten minutes.

 

The next night onstage, she feels like she’s alive again. She struts around and flirts with all three of the other girls, singing backup into Darcy’s mic and winking at girls in the crowd. She feels Wanda’s sigil burning like a brand into her stomach, lighting a fire within her.

It almost, just for a minute, feels like Wanda’s there again.

 

It’s hotter than the hinges of hell when they amble into Brooklyn the first afternoon in July. Natasha all but launches herself out of the bus and onto the street, stuck in a sticky-hot alley alongside the Warsaw but it’s enough.

She’s home.

She doesn’t take a cab home and fall into her bed like she wants to; she doesn’t call Bucky or Steve or set off to find Wanda with a boombox holding the song of her heart under her arm. She just strips down to her tanktop, grabs the cooler full of ice and bottles of water, and starts to help unload the equipment into the venue.

“We’re here,” Simon says from the room where they’ve all dropped their bags off. Natasha hangs back, a towel in her arms, intent on jumping into the shower and standing under icy cold water for as long as she can stand it. She stays quiet and listens, her heart racing loud in her ears; she knows he’s on the phone with Wanda.

“At, uh. Some place called Warsaw, in Brooklyn.” Another long pause and then an abrupt bark of Simon’s voice cuts through. “No, you aren’t. We talked about this, you are not fuckin’--”

His voice drops to a furious hiss, and Natasha digs her chewed-down nails into the towel she’s clutching.

“It doesn’t matter. You think that matters? You were with me the whole bloody tour, and you still somehow had time to shove your face in her fuckin’ gash, didn’t you?”

Natasha closes her eyes, taking a deep breath, trying to stay calm. Her ears are ringing with anger, but she still manages to catch on to the fact that Wanda hung up on him and that he’s absolutely livid.

He bursts through the open doorway and nearly runs into Natasha, their eyes locking for the first time since that night on the bus.

She stands up straight and stares at him placidly, head tipped to the side like she’s waiting for him to say something. His face is red, hand in a fist around his phone. His nostrils flare as he searches her eyes, his whole face pinched and ugly with disgust.

“You will stay away from her,” he starts, his voice trembling with the threat, “or I’ll--”

“What? Quit?” Natasha raises her eyebrows. “Go ahead.”

“Stay _away from her_.” He shoves her but she barely moves, just tenses her thighs and locks her knees and refuses to budge. If he only knew the men she’d faced in her life, he’d run. 

“I’d walk away, Simon,” she tells him, still not looking away. “I know four different ways to rip your balls off right now, and I’ve hurt men a lot worse for a lost less.”

“Hey,” comes Sif’s voice, loud and echoing from other end of the hallway, but she’s approaching quickly. “Everything okay?”

Natasha blinks at Simon, waiting for him to answer as Sif comes to a stop behind her, tall and unmoving as a fucking tree. Natasha leans back just enough to feel her.

Simon finally breaks eye contact and storms off, lifting his fist and punching the wall as he walks away.

“We’re not paying for that,” Sif calls after him.

Natasha’s shaking from held-in anger, and she gives Sif a tight smile before lowering her eyes.

“Gonna go shower and maybe walk around the neighborhood. I’ll see you later?” 

Sif nods in reply, reaching up to give Natasha’s arm a squeeze. They lean in and kiss, fast and chaste on the lips, before going their separate ways again.

The ride is almost over, and Natasha cannot fucking wait to get off.

 

By 9pm, the Warsaw is packed with bodies, nearly 600 of them, and Natasha is pacing backstage, chainsmoking and sucking down bottle after bottle of water in an effort to avoid the free alcohol at the bar.

She pulls her phone out of her pocket and reads the last text from Bucky sent twenty minutes ago that just says _on our way_. The show starts in ten minutes, and her weird little clan still isn’t here. She can’t go on without them out there, she just couldn’t handle being home and not looking out and seeing their faces. 

“Nat!” 

It’s Bucky’s voice, live and in color, and Natasha nearly drops her cigarette as she spins around to face the direction it came from.

There they are, all eight of them, all with matching smiles when they see her.

She bursts into tears.

“What the hell?” Tony exclaims in his perfect mix of concern and teasing. “I’ve only ever seen you cry during Little Women! You’re breaking out the waterworks for little ol’ us?”

“Shut up,” Natasha laughs as they surround her, all of them closing in for a big, clumsy group hug. “That was a secret.”

They close in tight around her, and Natasha just grabs on to the nearest waist and holds on, letting them pet and kiss and squeeze at her in ways that she would never, ever allow in normal circumstances. She sighs and relaxes for what feels like the first time in years. 

“Good to see you too, kid,” Thor mumbles, his giant arms around her.

“You look thin,” Loki remarks, sounding concerned. She feels a hand squeeze at her waist and she reaches over to swat it away.

“Like you can talk,” she replies, making sure to look up at him with a smile. “I’m so glad you all made it. I was getting worried.”

They pull back and stand like normal people, and Natasha lifts the bottom of her custom-destroyed black t-shirt to dab delicately at her face. Darcy’ll kill her if she messes up her eyeliner.

“Sorry, that was me,” Steve says, looking chastised and apologetic. “My shift at the hospital ran over--”

“And we couldn’t leave without him,” Sam finishes, cutting off what is probably a long story. “Hey, y’all, let’s go grab our seats and give her some room. Nat, we’ll see you after the show, okay?”

She nods, offering her cheek for the kiss each one of them gives her until she’s left with just Steve and Bucky. Bucky leans in and rests his forehead against hers, and she lets out a sigh when she feels Steve’s arms around them both.

“So glad you’re home,” Bucky says quietly, making her eyes burn again, her throat tightening around the painful need to cry and not stop until she passes out. She smiles instead, pressing a kiss to Bucky’s cheek and then lifting up on the tips of her toes to kiss Steve’s.

“Promise me we’ll curl up in bed and sleep until noon. Please.”

“Done,” Steve replies, reaching for Bucky’s hand and tugging on him until he untangles from Natasha. “We’ll be off to the right of the stage, and we’ll come find you as soon as the show’s over, okay?” 

Natasha watches them walk off; Steve in his leather jacket, white t-shirt and cuffed jeans, and Bucky in his Sparklehorse shirt under the flannel he’s worn for probably five years now, his torn-up jeans, and his Vans.

She smiles.

She’s believed in soulmates her whole life, even when she believes in absolutely nothing else. Steve and Bucky hadn’t given her a choice. She’s seen it with her own eyes, seen what it’s like when two people very truly complete each other, when they cannot live without each other, when they just are not fully themselves unless the other one is there.

She’s wondered her whole life if Steve and Bucky were a fluke, if she would ever know what it was like if she met someone who made her feel like they do when they’re together. But she knows now. She knows just how it feels, and she can’t just let it go.

She can’t just let Wanda go. Not without a fight. Not without trying.

And if there’s anything Natasha Romanoff is, it’s a fighter. She’s been training her whole life to fight for her happiness, when she finally found it. And now it’s time.

“Nat, let’s go!” Darcy calls.

She grabs her guitar from the rack and tugs it over her body, her heart pounding like a war drum as she stands by herself in the dark.

“Just do it,” she whispers to herself.

She stalks up toward the stage, not stopping when she nears the rest of Pussy Party. She walks right up onstage, into the bright lights, the other girls filing in behind her. The crowd erupts in cheers, and Carol steps up to the mic.

“Thank you, Brooklyn. Fuck, it’s good to be home.”

Sif counts off with her drumsticks, and Natasha leans back, her whole body relaxing as they launch into “Candy Stealer.”

Her little family takes up the whole right half of the stage, and she plays to them with the goofiest grin she’s probably ever had while sober. Even Bucky who is right up against the stage with Steve’s big, solid body wrapped up behind him, acting as a barrier between him and the rest of the writhing crowd, is grinning, singing along in a self-conscious little mumble and sticking his tongue out at Natasha when they make eye contact. 

She can’t help but look around between songs, her eyes darting over the crowd, searching for red, for a particular fall of dark auburn hair, for those soft round cheeks and those eyes that are an exact match to her own.

She finds her three songs in.

She nearly falters when she realizes it, her fingers slipping on the strings so that she misses a chord. Darcy looks over at her immediately, big blue eyes brimming with concern. She follows Natasha’s gaze and realizes what’s going on before Natasha can even recover from it.

Darcy is at her side in a few seconds, their shoulders pressed together so they can play in tandem. Natasha leans on her, her eyes unmoving now that she’s found her.

She’s at the back of the room and seated at the bar next to Simon, the lights over the bar acting as a spotlight on them. Simon is talking to someone next to him, not even paying attention, and Wanda is staring at her, looking right back with her dark-rimmed eyes, her pretty mouth painted bright red, face carefully blank but she doesn’t look away.

They don’t look away.

The song ends and Darcy goes back to her own mic to do backing vocals on the next one, and Carol takes the time to step in close to Natasha, her mouth against her ear to avoid the microphone.

“You okay?”

Natasha nods, finally tearing her eyes away from Wanda and looking down at her shaking hands.

“Anything I can do?” Carol asks, pulling back to meet Natasha’s eyes. It comes like an epiphany, like some kind of divine inspiration, her face burning at the thought but god, she’s gotta try. She has to try.

“Let me have the last song,” she replies, her voice trembling but decisive. Carol’s eyes widen but she nods almost immediately, wrapping the mic cord around her hand and walking away from her, back to the front.

“You got it,” Carol tells her, turning to face the crowd and starting up the next song with her signature growling shriek that always makes Sam cover his ears. 

_Shit_ , Natasha thinks to herself as her fingers fly over the neck of her guitar. _Now I’ve gotta sing._

 

“So, uh,” she says breathily into the mic over the rowdy cheers of the crowd. She looks out over the sea of people who are glistening with sweat and wild-eyed by the end of the show, who are waiting for the last song and probably expecting Natasha to deliver something ferocious and loud. “I don’t usually sing--”

“You sing in the shower!” Loki yells out oh-so helpfully. Natasha turns to glare at him while crowd laughs.

“But this is kind of… one of those moments where you’ve just gotta overcome your fear, and…” She licks her lips, so nervous that she feels dizzy. She looks to the back of the room and finds Simon and Wanda both looking at her. Wanda’s eyes are huge, her arms wrapped around the sweater she’s holding, and she looks just as frozen and terrified as Natasha feels.

“This is my _Say Anything_ moment, I guess,” she continues, feeling the wrath of Simon from all the way up here but she doesn’t look over, just keeps her eyes on Wanda. “I know it’s cliche as hell to say this, but this is a song I swear was written for this one girl. This girl who, um.”

She looks away from Wanda now, her cheeks burning hot, fingers dancing nervously over her guitar.

“I’m not the most open person in the world, and uh. I can be hard to get to know, but. But I met somebody who kinda cracked me open, and I don’t really know how to go back together again unless it’s with her. And so this song’s for her. For my Rhiannon.”

She lifts her eyes again and finds Wanda’s effortlessly, amazed at the way she can see tears glistening in them from all the way up here.

“This is for you,” she says softly.

“Ah,” she sighs into the mic, letting her eyes fall closed, letting everything drop away except this feeling under her skin, the one that gathers up in her throat and leaves her in the low, gritty warmth of her unrefined voice. “Now I don’t hardly know her, but I think I could love her. Crimson and clover.”

She strums in time with Sif on the drums, glancing over to where Carol is standing in the wings with her arms wrapped around Kamala. Both of them are beaming at her.

“Ah, when she comes walkin’ over.” She plays even harder, the sound blaring from the speakers, maybe a little rougher than Joan Jett’s version. “Now I’ve been waitin’ to show her. Crimson and clover. Over and over…”

“Yeah, my love’s such a sweet thing.” She locks eyes with Wanda again and grins at her, bright and bursting and something she couldn’t contain if she tried. “I wanna do everything. What a beautiful feeling. Crimson and clover. Over and over.”

The breakdown starts and she dances as she plays, feeling younger and more reckless than she ever has before, and she laughs when she looks over and sees Darcy rocking out with her, jumping around and acting even more ridiculous than she is.

“Crimson and clover, over and over, crimson and clover, over and over…” The whole place is singing along, a bunch of punkass kids singing a song written by a bubblegum pop group almost fifty years ago. It fades out, and they erupt in cheers, tattooed arms up in the air, smiles on every face she sees.

Until she looks at Simon.

“Thanks,” she mumbles, catching Wanda’s gaze one last time before she walks off stage, leaving the applause for the others. 

Backstage is a blur of hands and voices, and she wades through them while she tries to calm down and wrestle her guitar off of her body at the same time. 

“Nat,” comes Steve’s voice from nearby, and his hands are suddenly on her shoulders. “Ohmygod, I can’t believe you did that. I’m so proud of--”

“I have to see her,” she rushes out, not even looking at him or Bucky who is hovering beside them nervously, his eyes wide and bright in the dark. “Please, I need to--”

“C’mon.” Steve puts an arm around her, pulling her close and leading her to the side of the stage and the stairs there. Bucky grabs on to the back of her shirt the way he used to when they were little, and together they step down into the crowd and Steve shoulders their way through as politely as anyone can at a punk show.

“They were in the back,” she yells so Steve can hear her. “At the bar.”

The seats at the bar are filled when they finally get there, and Wanda’s nowhere to be seen. She pushes her way through the people leaning in to try and place their drink orders, and she steps up onto the rung of the nearest stool to tower over all of them and beckon the bartender over.

“The girl,” she shouts over the crowd. “In red. The one who was right here the whole show. Where’d she go?”

“Dragged out by some guy,” the bartender replies, sliding drinks across the counter to two waiting girls before filling two more glasses with ice. “They were fighting like cats and dogs, and they finally left. He was kind’ve a dick, if you wanna know the truth.”

Natasha drops back down to the floor and turns around to see Steve standing on his tip toes to scan the crowd while Bucky curls down over his phone.

“He’s calling her,” Steve reports. Bucky shakes his head after a moment and pockets his phone again, looking up at Natasha through his long hair.

“Sorry,” he says quietly.

“Shit,” she breathes. She’s still shaking with adrenaline from playing and she’s coming down hard, the emotions she’s been holding in the whole show finally surfacing. “Steve. Steve, I--”

“The afterparty is at the house,” he reminds her. “Come on, let’s get you home. We can beat them all there, and you can pull yourself together before she shows up.”

“She won’t be there,” Natasha whispers to herself, but she follows when Steve wraps an arm around her again and leads her out of the venue.

 

She’s not here.

There’s at least fifty people downstairs once Natasha gets out of the shower, finds something kinda hot to wear, and smoke enough weed to feel calmer. She hits the bottom step and looks around at all the people, anxiety still pushing at the edges of her vision.

 _You can always go back upstairs with Steve and Bucky_ she reminds herself as she grips the smooth wood bannister. _You don’t have to stay._

“There she is!” Tony is obviously already well on his way to being trashed, and his smile is massive and bright white before he wraps her up in a hug. She sinks into it, hugging him back with one arm while the other keeps hold of the bannister. She pulls back and meets his eyes, giving him a weak smile.

“So, uh. I guess I owe you an apology for the whole… Simon thing,” she manages, shoving her hands into her back pockets and forcing herself to hold eye contact.

“Eh,” Tony replies, shrugging and lifting a hand to wave it flippantly. “It is what it is. Simon’s a big boy. And it’s not like he’s a serial monogamist either. He’s just pissed that he went on tour with a bunch of lesbians who he had no chance of fucking, and his girlfriend got laid instead.”

Natasha just blinks at him.

“Well, it’s… I mean, the whole thing with Wanda wasn’t just… sex. We were--”

“I know, babe. I heard the love confession and the song. Nice choice, by the way.”

“I didn’t confess my love!” She hunches her shoulders defensively as she tries to fight the way her cheeks heat up and loses.

“It was cuuuute.” Tony makes a stupid kissy face at her and reaches up to squeeze her cheeks. “I’m proud of you, kid.”

“It doesn’t matter,” she replies, reaching up to swat his hands away. “She’s not here.”

“Yeah, I haven’t seen her.” He glances around with a fast dart of his big brown eyes. “Vision is here though. So I’d steer clear of him.”

“No problem,” she mumbles, wiping away the sloppy kiss Tony presses to her cheek and stepping down into the mass of bodies, looking for the nearest source of alcohol.

She mills around for awhile, trying to be as social as she can while she keeps her eyes open for the bright scarlet of the dress she saw Wanda wearing. She restrains herself with the liquor, only allowing herself three beers to go with the two bowls she smoked with Bucky upstairs. 

She feels liquid and warm and miserable when she sinks down on the couch beside a guy and a girl who are making out, sweat staining the pits of her blazer and making the tie around her throat feel like it’s strangling her.

She reaches up to loosen it, feeling restless and kind of wretched and like she wants to claw her own skin off, and she’s got her hand braced on the arm of the couch to push herself up when she sees her.

It’s like a scene from a movie, the way she walks in, the way she looks, the way everyone seems to part to reveal her to Natasha.

Her dress is just as red as she remembers from the show, it’s cinched in right beneath the swell of her breasts and flows out into a skirt that looks as soft and ruffles out into a shape that looks like the petals of a rose. It hits high on her thighs, her legs long and tan from their summer on the road, her calves tight and fucking beautiful because of her strappy black heels. Her hair is long and loose and falling over her bare shoulders, and when she looks at Natasha, when she meets her eyes, it takes everything in Natasha not to sink to her knees right there.

Natasha pushes herself to her feet, heavy and clumsy and inherently unworthy, and they stand a few yards apart and just stare, letting the moment stretch out between them until it’s almost unbearable, but god, Natasha’s just savoring. 

It feels just right. Exactly like everything she’d always been too afraid to allow herself to dream about.

She takes a single step forward just as Wanda blinks, her long lashes fluttering on her cheeks like she just woke up. She looks away from Natasha, ducking her head and Simon is there all of a sudden, blocking Natasha’s view of her.

She just watches as Wanda wraps a hand around Simon’s arm and pulls him away, into the crowd and gone. Natasha is left standing alone, her hands useless at her sides, her heart still pumping fast in her ears.

Everything is too much suddenly, the music blaring in her ears, the room too hot, too many people here. She can’t be here a second longer.

She shoves through the crowd, ignoring the shouts of her name and the people who yell after her for how hard she’d pushed them, and she doesn’t stop until she’s thundering up the stairs and down the hallway, passing Bucky and Steve’s room to get to her own.

She closes her door and locks it, not even feeling the tears that slip down her cheeks, smearing her eyeliner and finally letting some of the pain seep out.

It’s stupid, but she’d been so sure. She’d been so fucking sure that it would work out, that they could fix this. It’s an odd feeling to have her heart broken, so strange that she’d let herself get to the point of giving anyone the opportunity to do it.

She’d never been allowed to be a child, not really, but she’s never been good at being an adult either.

She rips her blazer off and throws it across the room, pacing the floor like a caged animal while she tears at her carefully styled hair. She’s breathing too fast, too hard, and she doesn’t know what to fucking do with herself now that this is over.

Maybe she needs to just leave. Maybe she needs to go, to get out of this city for awhile. Pepper moved to Los Angeles after she’d graduated from college, and she’d offered Natasha a place to stay if she ever made it out to California.

It’d be a good place to lay low for awhile, to figure out what the fuck she wants to do.

She pulls her phone from her pocket, doing some quick math to figure out what time it is in LA before she opens up a text to Pepper and starts typing a long, tipsy, emotional paragraph that ends in _and I just don’t really want to even exist right now let alone be in this goddamn city for one more fcuking second and so can I come stay with you pretty pretty please_ and she almost, almost hits send, but there’s a knock on her door.

She turns and stares at the door, her finger poised over the screen.

“Who is it?” she manages, goosebumps flying over her arms.

“It’s me.”

Natasha closes her eyes. She hasn’t heard her voice in nearly two weeks, and she’d somehow forgotten the depth of it, the sweetness. She turns off her phone without sending the text and shoves it into her pocket.

“Um, just.” She glances around her room that is still destroyed from when she was packing to go on tour, that still has plates stacked on the nightstand and an ashtray of cigarettes and joints and it maybe permanently smells like pizza and sex in here. “Just a minute.”

“You don’t have to clean up for me,” Wanda says through the door just as Natasha starts kicking clothes under her bed. “Please, Nat.”

 _She’s here to break up with you,_ she reminds herself as she fixes her hair in the mirror and tries to wipe at her ruined eyeliner. _No need to impress her._

She pauses with her hand on the doorknob, gathering her courage as much as possible before she turns it, opening the door to reveal Wanda. It’s dark in the hallway but her eyes seem to glow in the faint light from outside her window. Her lips are still the kind of red usually reserved for fantasies, and that dress.

“God, that dress,” Natasha whispers.

She looks up to meet Wanda’s eyes finally and finds them brimming with tears, her delicate hands twisted up cruelly together in front of her.

“Nat,” she gasps, soft and pleading and she’s stepping forward and Natasha reaches for her, grabbing her by the waist and gathering her up to pull her into the room completely. She kicks the door closed and lifts Wanda up, letting her wrap her legs around her waist as she presses her back against it. They stare at each other, both of them breathless and not blinking, and they move in at the same time to find each other’s mouths.

It’s a kiss that obliterates everything, that shatters all the pain and loneliness and despair that she’d been feeling for the last couple of weeks, one that tells her every single thing she needs to know.

That Wanda is hers.

“Baby,” she breathes against her lips, tasting the wax of her lipstick as they smear it between their hungry mouths. “Wanda, god, I missed you. I fuckin’ missed you so much I--”

“I broke up with him.” They pull back just enough to lock eyes again, and Natasha can only stare at her, at the tears slipping down her face, at the scarlet mess of her mouth, at the way her chin trembles. She holds her even tighter, one arm under her ass to keep her up, the other one braced around her back. “I… I couldn’t do it anymore. I don’t know what I’m going to do, where I’m gonna live, but I just couldn’t stand it. I couldn’t stay away from you. I need you too much.”

“Not too much,” Natasha tells her, leaning up to kiss her pretty, ruined mouth as her hand slides up to cradle the back of Wanda’s head. She’s so happy she feels like she’s not even real, like this kind of moment could never possibly happen to her. “I promise it’s not too much.”

“I love you,” Wanda blurts out on a sob, her arms wrapping around Natasha’s neck, pulling her in so close that Wanda’s hair is a shroud around them, hiding them in a tiny sanctuary where absolutely no one else could exist. “I just… I love you, Natasha. Please forgive me.”

“Nothing to forgive.” Natasha lowers her to the ground, kissing her mouth almost obsessively as she sets her down again. She sinks down to her knees because she simply can’t stand anymore, can’t do anything but fall to her ass and lean back on her hands, her head tipped up, letting those words wash over her like they’re being sung by a choir.

“Are you okay?” Wanda stands in front of her uncertainly, fingers playing with the short, ruffled skirt of her dress, and Natasha gazes at her with what is probably a stupid, drunken smile on her face.

“Take your shoes off,” she tells her, ignoring the thump of the music from the party downstairs, the voices in the hallway outside the door, ignoring the almost overwhelming desire to ask Wanda to move in with her right now and just concentrating on the way Wanda’s cheeks flush, the way she leans down gracefully and unbuckles both of her shoes and steps out of them, dropping down a clean four inches to her bare feet.

She stares at Natasha serenely, her body loose with submission as she waits for another order.

“Panties,” Natasha whispers.

Lovely hands sliding up equally beautiful thighs and disappearing up under the skirt while Natasha watches, unabashed. They’re barely a scrap of fabric, just a tiny, lacy black thong, and it hangs off the crook of her forefinger for just a second before falling to the floor. Natasha licks her lips, her mouth suddenly flooded with saliva at the memory of the taste of her.

“Show me,” she murmurs, still resting back on her hands and staring up at her, loving and hating that she’s so far away, that she’s not close enough to touch.

Wanda is breathing hard, her breasts swelling against the low neckline of her little dress, but her eyes never leave Natasha’s face. She gathers her dress up with slow, careful fingers, revealing inch after inch of smooth, soft thigh until there’s none left. She hikes it up a little higher, revealing just the tiniest hint of her bare cunt, just the shadowed dream of her pussylips and then finally the dress is high enough to show off everything.

“C’mere.” Natasha’s voice is so low she barely even recognizes it. She watches the gentle shudder of her thighs, the delicious, barely there spread of her pussy as she walks closer, and she doesn’t even have to tell Wanda what to do next.

She steps up until she’s standing over top of Natasha, her cunt positioned right over Natasha’s face, the smell of it soft and earthy and overwhelmingly familiar. She sits up now, nose bumping against Wanda’s silky little mound as she slides her hands up the sides of her legs, up over the thick softness of her thighs and the juicy swell of her ass.

She tugs Wanda forward and tips her face up, getting in one deep breath before Wanda sits on her face, smothering her in pussy.

Wanda drops the dress, letting it fall around Natasha’s face, hiding her underneath it as her thighs press in tight on either side of Natasha’s cheeks. Natasha opens her mouth wide, letting her tongue slide up and in so she can lap at her cunt, letting Wanda’s clit settle against her nose.

She makes the prettiest, broken sounds, her hands gripping at Natasha’s head through the dress while she eats her out, and Natasha pulls on her, squeezing her ass hard to encourage Wanda to move, to ride her face, to suffocate her in the delicious, honeyed center of her cunt.

Wanda spreads her legs wider and squats on top of her, moving her hips almost vulgarly as she grinds against Natasha’s face, using the whole surface of it to get herself off. Natasha just moans, lapping at her as Wanda’s cunt gets juicier and juicier, hands wrapped around her thighs now to get her to move harder, faster.

When Wanda comes, it floods Natasha’s mouth, gushing out in a creamy, dripping mess right over her tongue. Natasha buries her face deeper and shakes her head hard back and forth, letting the bridge of her nose rub against her clit to pull an even longer climax out of her. 

“Shit,” Wanda pants, lifting the dress finally and pulling off of Natasha’s face, staring down at her like she’s a miracle when she’s really just red-faced and covered in pussy slick and still hungry for more. “God, come here. Come here and fuck me. Fuck me in your bed, Nat.”

Natasha pushes to her feet immediately, grabbing Wanda again and kissing her, letting Wanda lick the come off her face while she runs her hands over Wanda’s body, looking desperately for the zipper.

“Here.” Wanda laughs, pressing what feels like an adoring kiss to Natasha’s nose before she pulls back and reaches for a zipper apparently hidden under her arm and running down her waist. She helps Natasha pull it off of her and wrestles her way out of it, standing in front of Natasha in just a sheer black balconette bra as she lifts Natasha’s hands to her face, burying it against her palms.

“You’re shaking,” Wanda whispers into her hands, and Natasha just stands there, unable to deny it as Wanda kisses at her palms and her calloused fingers. She swallows thickly, somehow feeling like the one who’s naked even though she’s completely dressed.

“I missed you,” she tells her, the words too small for what she’s feeling. It’s so frustrating, to feel so much and not have the vocabulary for it, to have no way to tell this girl how much she means to her. Wanda nods, pressing a final kiss to the center of both her hands before she releases them, turning her attention to Natasha’s clothes now.

She doesn’t move, just watches Wanda in a daze while Wanda tugs her tie loose and slides it off, unbuttoning her dress shirt and slipping it off her shoulders. She leans in and kisses across Natasha’s collarbone, mouthing over her throat while she unhooks Natasha’s bra and pulls it off before taking off her own.

Their breasts press soft and full against each other when they come together again, Wanda’s arms around Natasha’s neck while she wraps her own around her waist, and Wanda’s grin is contagious when they press their mouths together.

“I have something I…” Natasha trails off, strangely shy even here in the safety of this room, with this girl. Wanda tips her head to the side, eyebrows drawing together while she waits for Natasha to continue.

“Tell me,” Wanda prompts gently.

“There’s something I’ve had for awhile that I’ve never used with anybody else. And I was just. I want to use it with you. If you’ll let me.”

“Natasha, you can do literally anything you want to me,” Wanda replies as she unbuttons Natasha’s pants, sliding them down her hips along with her briefs. Natasha kicks it all off along with her socks and shoes, leaving them naked and pressed together with no fear of being caught, with nothing separating them now.

Wanda walks back towards the bed and collapses back on it when she reaches it. She bends her legs at the knee and spreads them wide, her pussy the sweetest pink and glistening with come and Natasha’s spit. She slides a hand down between her legs and runs her fingers over her slit, her middle finger catching on the fat nub of her clit and rubbing it, slow and deep.

“Anything,” Wanda repeats but it’s breathy now, wanton with her flushed thighs spread, her fingers making soft, wet sounds as she rubs herself. Her eyes are dark and dilated, her lashes heavy as she starts to breathe harder, and she’s never looked more beautiful because there is nothing but trust between them now; nothing but trust in every move Wanda’s making.

Natasha can feel it; it’s now or never.

She goes to her closet and opens it up, pushing up to her tiptoes and reaching for a box on the top shelf. She opens it on her desk and pulls out the toy in it, returning to Wanda.

Wanda whimpers, her hips lifting up toward her hand as she turns to watch Natasha reach into the bedside table and pulls out the bottle of lube there. She slicks up the smaller, fat end of the toy and lifts one of her legs to rest her foot on the bed, giving Wanda a front row seat to what she’s about to do.

Her own cunt is wet because she just ate Wanda out, and she rubs the blunt head of the toy around outside before she starts to work it into herself, stretching herself out wider than she’s used to, wider than she’s taken anything in a long time.

“Ohmygod, Nat,” Wanda whispers, abandoning her playing and sliding over to get closer to Natasha, her slick hand on her thigh, face so close as she watches Natasha lodge the short part of the cock inside of herself. 

It finally slips into place and stays where it is, her internal muscles keeping a firm hold on it. A thick, long dick stands up from between her legs now, curving up to nail g-spots and swaying heavily out of her.

She climbs up onto the bed with the bottle of lube, finally looking down at Wanda who is staring at her with more lust than she’s ever seen on anyone before.

“Can I?” she breathes, on all fours in front of Natasha, her mouth so close to Natasha’s cock. 

Natasha doesn’t answer, just drops the bottle of lube and reaches down for her dick, giving it a couple of strokes while she slips her other hand into Wanda’s hair, gripping it firmly and guiding her down, slipping the head of her cock into her pink mouth.

Wanda sucks cock like a dream, her full mouth stretched around the girth of it, those lovely eyes lifted to stare right up at Natasha while Natasha fucks steady and shallow into her mouth, over her slick tongue. 

“Love this big cock,” Wanda whispers as she pulls back, tonguing just the head of her dick and diving back in, taking more of it into her mouth and down into her throat, gagging around the length of it. Natasha moans at the sound, tightening her grip on Wanda’s head and pulling on it, making her take more cock even faster.

She yanks her off after Wanda gags good and loud on it, pulling her so that her spit-slicked lips are still attached to the head of Natasha’s cock with glistening strands of saliva. They stare at each other, both of them dripping with lust but it’s more than that, more intensity than she’s ever felt with a girl on her knees for her.

“Lay back, babe,” she says quietly, releasing her hair and letting Wanda settle back against the pillows again, spreading out just as easy and lovely as she had earlier. Natasha grabs the lube and squeezes some out into her palm, and she settles back on her haunches between Wanda’s legs as she jacks herself, slicking her cock up and staring at the beautiful girl in front of her.

The toy moves inside of her, pressed so fully against her g-spot that it aches, makes her feel hot and swollen and like her dick really is hard. She grabs a pillow and pushes it under Wanda’s hips, tipping them up so she can get to her pussy better. She’s worn this cock by herself, stalked around her room and stared at her reflection in the mirror, gotten used to the weight of it, of how to move her hips and use it well; how to treat it like it’s actually her dick.

She grips the middle of it and pushes the head against Wanda’s cunt, letting it rub all over her, the tip of it pressed firmly against her clit. Wanda gasps, her body straining up, breasts shuddering as she shivers.

“You like your clit played with, don’t you?” Natasha whispers just to say it, just to watch Wanda’s face flush. She only nods in reply, and Natasha rewards her by rubbing her dick harder against it, her arm tense with how fast she’s moving, but she’s determined to make Wanda come now. 

“Look at that pussy work.” Natasha licks her lips while Wanda’s cunt clenches and swells under the relentless movement. It’s so loud and watery now, her cock moving over the surface of her pink pussy, it’s so delicious that Natasha wants nothing more than to get her mouth on it and taste the slick but she just stays where she is, gripping Wanda’s thigh and masturbating her pretty girl. 

“You get so wet, doll. Pussy’s so fuckin’ wet for me. You hear it? Hear how wet you are?”

“Yeah,” Wanda whimpers, her whole body arched up, straining down against Natasha’s dick, trying to get more friction.

“Gonna come for me?”

“Y-Yeah, Nat, oh fuck.” She’s gasping now, her eyes rolling back in her head, one her hands down to spread her pussylips to give Natasha more surface to rub against, her clit standing up stiff and fat for Natasha to stroke perfectly with her dick. Natasha grits her teeth, tightens her grip on her cock, and lifts it up to spank down on her clit, slapping her with dick until she’s screaming, her hips arching up off the bed as she comes brutally hard.

Natasha falls down on top of her right in the middle of her orgasm, sliding up to hold the base of her dick now and plunging it into Wanda’s cunt, right in the middle of all those pulsing contractions. She grabs Wanda’s legs and hauls them up onto her shoulders, sliding her dick right in to the hilt, buried as deep inside of Wanda as she can possibly be.

“Ohmygod,” Wanda sobs, tightening her legs around Natasha’s neck, knees hooking over her shoulders so she can cross her ankles behind her head. Her hands slide back to grip Natasha’s thick ass, hauling her in closer with her grip on it. “Do me hard. Fuck it really hard, Nat, really, really hard.”

Natasha spreads her knees and shoves in, her arms on either side of Wanda’s body, containing her completely under herself, cradling her there, and she lifts her hips like the expert cock-owner she is and lets go. She packs it in deep and almost viciously hard, fucking through all that tight muscle that is still gripping her, trying to keep her in, wanting it to be flooded with come and loose when she’s done with it. 

“Right there,” Wanda suddenly whispers, her fingernails digging into Natasha’s ass, her pupils so huge they take up nearly her entire eye. “Right there right there don’t stop. Don’t stop please don’t stop.”

Natasha can be obedient when she wants to, and she keeps her hips laser-accurate and careful but she speeds up her thrusts, pounding into Wanda’s pussy, pushing up as hard as she can to lay into her g-spot.

“Pull out,” Wanda begs her, trying to push her away but she’s riding down on Natasha’s dick, sending mixed signals like crazy but Natasha listens to her. She lifts up and pulls her dick out, looking down at Wanda’s cunt that is swollen and dripping wet and pushed out, gaping for cock.

“Did you come?” Natasha licks her lips, fingers sliding around over the throbbing surface of her pussy, making it twitch.

“I don’t…” Wanda shifts on the bed, trying to get at those fingers. Natasha gives them to her, feeding three of them up into her pussy all the way to the last knuckle. Wanda moans, gripping at her fingers. “It felt weird. Like… like I was…”

“Like you were gonna pee?” Natasha lets one of Wanda’s legs drop off her shoulder and she moves to get down closer to her pussy, curling her fingers up to press hard on her g-spot again. Wanda nods frantically while Natasha fucks at it, her hands grappling desperately at Natasha’s body, finally settling on her biceps. “Do you squirt?”

“No,” Wanda gasps, digging her fingers in hard enough to bruise. “Don’t stop, god, that feels so fucking good--”

“Just let it happen,” Natasha tells her, her eyes wide with fascination as she fucks Wanda’s pussy with three strong guitarist fingers. “If you feel like you’re gonna pee, just let it--”

“God, I _can’t_ \--” Tears slip down the sides of Wanda’s face.

“Yeah, you can, it’s okay. It’s okay, it’s--”

“Fuck! Fuck, ohmygod!”

Wanda’s cunt all but forces Natasha’s fingers out and she squirts fucking everywhere, spraying Natasha’s face and her tits and Natasha growls, lowering down to latch onto Wanda’s pussy and catch the last few sprays of clear, magic liquid right into her mouth from the source.

Wanda is convulsing on the bed, only the whites of her eyes showing, her whole body flushed hot and red, and she finally sucks in a breath and lets out a sob, pulling at Natasha, trying to yank her back up onto her body.

“Fuck me,” she manages to whisper. “Fuck me right now.”

Natasha slides up immediately, her whole face dripping as she plunges her dick back into Wanda’s pussy and puts her ass into it, fucking her with more focused intensity than she’s ever had in her life. The fat plug in her own cunt is knocking against her g-spot with every thrust, but it just makes her wet, just makes her feel like this is real, like she’s really inside of Wanda and she’s feeling the clutch of her beautiful cunt and she’s--

“Now! Now now now.”

Natasha pulls out again and Wanda sprays between their bodies, soaking them both and she’s honest to god crying now, shaking so hard she can’t find Natasha to pull her close.

Natasha goes anyway, forcing her cock back into that rigidly tensed pussy and grinding inside of her now, staying deep so she can fuck herself, too. She’s dripping wet with squirted-out slick, and Wanda is barely conscious under her, is soft and sweet and boneless and has her mouth open for Natasha to kiss into.

“Let me come in your pussy,” she whispers, grinding in nasty-deep, still managing to pull hissed, almost pained whimpers from Wanda even though she can barely keep her eyes open. “Let me knock you up.”

“Do it,” Wanda breathes against her mouth, their tits smashed together, nipples rubbing, their soft stomachs bumping with every dirty curl of Natasha’s hips. “Wanna feel it.”

Natasha’s cunt grips hard at the toy as she thrusts, and when she comes, she swears she can feel it pulled out of her and funneled down through the dick and into Wanda’s pussy. She fucks her desperately, their bodies slapping together, foreheads pressed hard.

“You feel it?” she groans, pushing up hard inside of her, churning all that come around. “You feel my load?”

“ _Fuck_.” Wanda’s thighs tighten around her again, and she trembles out a fourth orgasm seemingly from the thought of Natasha coming inside of her alone.

“Keep all that come inside of you,” Natasha tells her, kissing her slack mouth, bumping the head of her dick around deep inside of Wanda. “Wanna make sure it takes.”

Wanda moans, smiling against her lips, her tongue slipping out to skirt along Natasha’s, flicking dirty and sweet at it before Natasha’ pushes them both back into Wanda’s mouth.

“I’ve never done that before,” Wanda whispers, staring up into Natasha’s eyes in wonder. “That was amazing.”

“I think I’ve found a new hobby.” Natasha grins at the way Wanda laughs and still somehow manages to blush even though Natasha’s dick is still inside of her.

They both jump at the knock on the door.

“Uh,” Sam starts. Natasha snorts and ducks her head, burying her face in Wanda’s tits. “Just wanted to make sure y’all were okay. That I don’t need to call the cops because a girl was murdered in there or somethin’.”

“Nope, no murder,” Natasha replies, turning her head to yell toward the door. “But you might wanna tell Tony to send the cleaning lady up here tomorrow morning.”

“Nat!” Wanda hisses, slapping her on the ass.

“Don’t wanna know! La la la la!” Sam sings as he very obviously hurries away from the door. 

Natasha’s face hurts from smiling but it doesn’t stop her. She eases out of Wanda and carefully pulls the toy from her body, leaving her feeling loose and aching and used, and she’s kind of more than okay with it.

She drops it in the bathroom sink and grabs a towel, wiping herself down and returning to the room where Wanda is sprawled out in a daze on the bed. She cleans her off much more carefully, pressing kisses to her heated skin as she wipes each part. 

When she falls back into bed, she gathers Wanda to her, wrapping her arms and her legs around her and hugging her so hard that Wanda laughs.

“Mine,” Natasha says, childish and euphoric. Wanda sighs like she’s content with the whole world, sliding her arms around Natasha’s waist and relaxing against her.

“Yep,” she replies softly.

 

She wakes up to hear Flora muttering to herself as she wanders around Natasha’s room with a trash bag and a laundry basket.

Natasha grabs a t-shirt and boxers off the floor and dresses while Flora cleans off the top of her dresser, and she turns to find the woman glaring at her with her finger raised like a mother.

“You need to be cleaner!” Flora tells her. “Look at this bed!”

Natasha grins.

“I have a new girlfriend,” she confides. She watches Flora put it all together and kind of loves the horror that spreads over her face. The Spanish muttering now sounds like prayers to God, and Natasha presses a kiss to Flora’s cheek before she leaves the room.

There are voices coming from the kitchen, and she follows the sound of them and happens upon a dream.

“And Nat likes her eggs over-easy, which is pretty easy to remember because she totally goes over easy sometimes,” Bucky tells Wanda from his perch on a stool at the island, a mug of coffee clutched in his hands. He winks at Natasha when she pads into the room and grabs a mug of her own to fill with coffee.

“I like to call them down-easy, because I definitely do _that_ ,” Natasha adds, taking a sip from her coffee and watching Steve pull a whole tray of hot cinnamon rolls from the oven while Wanda cracks eggs into a bowl.

Wanda turns to look at her almost shyly, her lashes low over her pretty eyes. She’s wearing Natasha’s Cramps t-shirt and a pair of her pajama pants, and her hair is a long, feral mess down her back.

Natasha puts the coffee down and walks over to her, sliding up behind her while Wanda grabs the whisk and starts to beat the eggs for what Natasha assumes is for omelets. She presses a kiss to the side of Wanda’s neck, tucking her nose in and breathing in the smell of her sleep-warm skin.

“Good morning,” she murmurs.

“Morning,” Wanda whispers back, her cheeks plump with her bashful smile. Natasha’s hands spread out over her stomach, rubbing at it almost possessively as Wanda tips her head so they can kiss, slow and sweet and sleep-sour but who the fuck cares. Wanda goes back to the eggs and Natasha buries her face in her hair, just holding her while she works. Bucky and Steve are quiet behind them, probably watching with dopey smiles on their faces.

“I love you, too,” Natasha finally says with absolutely no warning or preparation, and it’s absolutely painless, not ripped from her like she always thought it would feel. She meets Wanda’s gaze head-on when she turns in her arms to face her, staring up at her in tearful amazement.

She take the hungry kiss Wanda gives her, gentling it until it’s soft and sweet and they’re smiling again, smiling like absolute idiots and like people that Natasha used to roll her eyes at.

“Pan’s ready,” Steve says quietly, and his bright blue eyes are tearful when Natasha looks over at him. She gives Wanda one final kiss before she lets her go. She sinks down next to Bucky at the island, coffee warming her hands, both of them watching Steve and Wanda move around the kitchen together, making breakfast and small talk like they’ve been doing this for years.

Bucky rests his cheek on her shoulder, and she lets her eyes fall closed, just for a second, letting this single moment wash over her so she can savor it. So she can keep it.

She knows without a doubt now that this is what happiness feels like.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **NEW STORY FOR THIS VERSE AS OF 12/15/15** :
> 
> [All Lit Up](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5432861), as a part of my 2015 fic advent calendar.

**Author's Note:**

>  **fanmixes on 8tracks:**  
> [natasha](http://8tracks.com/dollylux/held-in-and-hold-on) | [wanda](http://8tracks.com/dollylux/kept-secrets)


End file.
